#1 You Didn’t Hire an Actual ISA

As I mention in another post of mine, 7 Strategies To Build An Inside Sales Team, extensively evaluating your inside sales candidates during the hiring process is key. More important than hiring someone whose resume says they have a lot of real estate inside sales experience is hiring someone who can have effective sales conversations on the phone.

The most important skill your ISA needs is to be able to persuade people to take action through their conversations. If they can’t do that, if they aren’t motivated and energized by having sales conversations on the phone, then they are going to quickly lose confidence, have call reluctance, and most likely eventually fail.

What Drives People

So how do you inspire people to produce more value? I can definitely tell you what does not inspire people: fear. If the only thing driving your inside sales agent to pick up the phone and dial is fear of the consequences of not doing so, then they are not going to be successful on their calls and their numbers will likely fall even further. Fear of reprimand or termination if they don’t hit their numbers will increase stress and decrease confidence.

Instead of fear, offer your team opportunity and self-responsibility. What inspires people to work hard and consistently produce is the belief that their career and their life are in their own hands. That they are in control of their own advancement and have the real ability to improve their lives, set and meet personal goals, and be successful through working hard and constantly honing their skills.

Full time or part time ISA?

Let’s say you’ve determined that you are ready to hire an inside sales agent. Now the question becomes, should you hire a full time or a part time one?

A lot of people may lean towards a part time. They might think that it would be a good way to “get their feet wet” and test out having an ISA to see if they bring value to their business. If they are on the fence about whether their business needs an inside sales agent or not, they may think that hiring one part time is a cost effective compromise.

The truth, however, is that this is not the case.

Successfully training an ISA takes time. In fact, it could take up to between four and six months to effectively coach and evaluate if your ISA is productive or profitable. And it takes a considerable amount of effort and mental investment both on your part and on the new inside sales agent’s part.

Because of this, you need to make sure that the person you hire is fully invested and motivated to learn your process, to start making calls, and to begin to bring in business. Full-time ISAs are more likely to:

• Speak with enough contacts in order to build a good base of nurtures
• Meet the desired mark of two listing appointments per day

Most importantly though, they are less likely to give up on the process than a part time ISA is. This is because full time inside sales agents have more time to dedicate towards learning the process and they are more willing to because you are their sole source of employment.  

4. Use Numbers to Maintain Accountability

The fourth strategy tip for building an effective inside sales team is to have weekly accountability meetings with them, tell them what they need to do, then measure them CONSISTENTLY and CONSTANTLY. Developing experienced, productive ISAs is a cumulative process. You will find that they will progress from struggling to get contacts, to struggling to set appointments, struggling to get set appointments to actually meet, then get met appointments that turn into contracts. You need to work with them through these different stages.

5. Get in the Pit

The fifth strategy is closely related to the fourth. Just measuring their progress is not enough, it is critical that you get in the pit with them, listen to calls, review numbers, and actually hear what they are doing.

It’s one thing to roleplay, practice, and talk about theory, but you really have to hear how they are interacting with live humans. So in this part of the process you have to get more hands on and make sure that all the training is effective, as well as make sure your benchmarks and expectations are all being properly met. 

First, there are two broad categories of scripts that every real estate agent and ISA needs: one for inbound leads and one for outbound. In addition to those, there should also be special scripts for unusual leads like probate, home valuations, and specific scripts for unique offers.

The most important thing for all of them, however, is that each needs to be tailored to the type of lead you’ll be speaking with. The way you speak to and address a lead is different for people who have sought you out (inbound leads) and for people who you are essentially calling out of the blue (outbound leads).

Second, a good script is one that is straight to the point, asks great questions of the prospect, and has a close that contains a great value proposition. It also needs to not be too wordy and should mostly prompt the lead to do the talking.

Because script or no script, the key to a successful call is understanding what the lead is trying to accomplish, understanding what is preventing them from accomplishing it, and what their own existing plan is to overcome those obstacles.

Scripts as Part of an Overall System & Strategy

Real estate scripts are valuable as a general outline of how to approach the different types of leads and to make sure you are hitting all the points you need to hit. This is especially true for newer ISAs who are still learning the finer points of cold calling, sales calls, and converting leads over the phone.

They can’t, however, be the only thing in your wheelhouse. There are no magic scripts that will help you convert every time with every lead. Each conversation is different. To increase your success you have to focus on learning to deal with objections and how to get to the core of what the lead wants. Scripts are helpful to use as a general outline in case you get stuck on a call, but the key is focusing on having real conversations and producing real value for the lead.  

But looking back on it now, I think teams are probably the best way to get started in the real estate industry. And if I were to do it over again I would have started on a team. Even if you know you want to eventually go on your own and maybe even build your own team, you can gain invaluable experience by starting out working at a company or on a team.

They can offer you support, guidance, and even leads as you get started in the industry. It takes some of the stress of running the whole business off of your shoulders so you can focus on becoming a home selling ninja.

Do You Want to Build Something?  

For some people, the perceived increase of stability and security that come along with working with a team doesn’t interest them. They just need to create their own business and build something for themselves.  If you are one of these people, then you probably already know who you are. Once you realize this, it may be time to leave your real estate team.

But remember to treat yourself like a business. If you are already working with a team then the smart thing to do is to continue working with them until the benefits of leaving outweigh the benefits of staying.

If you are the type of person who hits a plateau and gets bored, then the correct time to leave is when you want more challenge, or feel it is time put your vision into practice. If you think you have a better way and you want to keep more of the fruits of your labor, then it is most likely time to leave your team and go alone.

In the End, the Choice Is Yours

The real estate industry is great because of the different avenues you are able to take within it. But in the end, the choice is yours. The important thing to do is make sure you are doing what you want to do, and doing it in a way that makes sense in view of your goals. Don’t work for a team that doesn’t appreciate you and doesn’t offer you value for value. And don’t work for yourself if you are not prepared to take on all of the responsibility and work.

Don’t get me wrong, I realize that this isn’t always practical. Depending on the size of your team and stream of leads from certain sources versus others, you may have to focus on the most productive sources at the expense of less productive ones.

If you have a real estate team with multiple inside sales agents, then the critical thing to do is prioritize lead sources for your different ISAs, depending on their skill and experience level. This is where having a larger team starts to exponentially work to your advantage. You can have your newer inside sales agents work the less productive or less valuable lead sources, while your more experienced ones work the more valuable sources.

What this does is twofold. This allows you to work all of your lead sources (because even those “less valuable” sources can still generate a lot of business for you) and also allows your newer ISAs to gain experience and hone their skills so they can graduate to also working the more productive sources.

Conclusion

The point is that all lead sources can be valuable to your real estate team. The seemingly less valuable sources can be valuable to you if your inside sales agents know how to properly work them. The key is to correctly prioritize the lead sources and determine which ISAs should be cross-trained to work all lead sources. Start the less experienced on the lower end of the list and then progress their skills up to working the most valuable leads.

There are plenty of lead sources out there, and you can take advantage of them all!

What Not to Do

Before we get to the most effective way to compensate your inside sales agent, let’s discuss the way that is less effective and that you should avoid.

This less effective way is a commission only pay structure. It is very difficult to develop a successful, long-term inside sales agent if they are paid solely on commission. While commission might make sense for real estate agents, for inside sales agents to make a decent living based only on commission they would have to be involved in a lot more sales.

They would also need to earn a substantially larger amount of the commission, which is not profitable for the team and would take away commission (and, consequently, incentive) from your real estate agents.

This system generally means longer periods of time between smaller paychecks for the ISAs. You run the risk of them favoring the “now” buyers or setting up appointments with less qualified leads because they are getting desperate and will try anything hoping it gets them paid.

You also run the risk of a high turn-over rate, which is bad news for you as a business owner or team leader because it drains a considerable amount of money. An Inside sales agent that you took the time to hire and train will cost you thousands or tens of thousands of dollars if they leave your company, forcing you to hire someone to replace them.

Average Compensation For Inside Sales Agents

An inside sales agent with little to no experience will normally make between $40,000 and $65,000 a year. More experienced ISAs will usually make between $60,000 and $80,000 a year. Both of these ranges include a base salary of between $24,000 and $30,000 a year.

The difference in the ranges between experienced and non-experienced ISAs is due to more experienced agents achieving increased commissions because they are more proficient in setting quality appointments. Simply put, the longer you are in this business, the more appointments and closings you are able to bring in.

Bonuses are compensated on 5% of gross commission income (GCI) after closing, with some real estate teams paying up to 10% of GCI. You may also go a different route and pay flat rate bonuses for appointments that actually took place—usually between $50 and $150 per conducted appointment.

However, with the latter you run the risk of your inside sales agents having an incentive to set lower quality appointments because they are paid based on appointments conducted, not as a result of a property closing.

Tie It All Together

If you are growing a real estate business you are going to hit a point where you need to hire an inside sales agent in order to continue to grow and be viable. When that day comes, the most important thing you can do is make the right hire.

Once you find that go-getter, cold calling ninja, the next most important thing is that you compensate them in a way that incentivizes them to both work with you, and set the highest number of quality appointments that they can. All while not breaking your bank.

But if you can do that, if you can find the right person and devise the right compensation package, then you will see a 5 to 1 ROI for your new inside sales agent. It’s all about incentives and putting them in the position to succeed.

Texting is the Present and the Future

But aside from using common sense, the wonderful modern world we live in is constantly providing solutions to our problems. In this case, I am referring to texting. Yep, texting. That practice, once derided by parents and embraced by the youth, has become increasingly critical to the real estate industry. And it is the key to achieving a balance between being annoying and being negligent.

This is primarily because the vast majority of people do not find texts to be a nuisance. This is in contrast to, say, phone calls, which more and more people see as an interruption or intrusion into their lives. I heard it once put like this, you should only call someone if whatever you need to discuss would warrant meeting with that person unannounced. If whatever you have to tell your client is not so urgent that you would show up unannounced, then send a text message.