Selling Real Estate vs Pet Rocks (WHY SELLING REAL ESTATE IS UNIQUE)
SUMMARY
In all traditional sales, the Salesperson represents the product or the company.
In real estate sales it is totally different. The Agent represents the Client. In most sales you are acting in your own best interest or the interest of your company. As a real estate agent, you are (or should be) acting in the best interest of your client…always.
Real estate is pretty much the only sales industry where you actually represent the client not the product. That changes everything about the way agents should approach their work. It also is why traditional sales training does not work well in real estate.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Hi there. It’s Kevin Ward, Founder of YESMASTERS Real Estate Success Training, and today I want to talk to you about selling pet rocks. Kind of serious about this, and I want to talk about how selling real estate is different than selling pet rocks. Other than the fact that the commissions are higher, there is no comparison. In fact, there is no comparison between selling real estate, and virtually any other type of sales in the world.
When you think about sales training, and all the sales training that’s out there, when you got into real estate they told you, “You need to read all the books you can on sales, and salesmanship, and selling, and all of that kind of stuff.” I remember when I got into real estate back in the 1900’s, they were just adamant in convincing me that I was a sales person. For me, I always hated the thought of being a sales person, because just the idea of being a used car salesman, and all of that, sales had a negative connotation for me, as it does for many of you that are watching this video. And, certainly for a lot of people out there, and when we talk about the reputation of real estate agents among the general population, the reputation of real estate agents is not exceptionally high. In fact, they say it just barely ranks above being a used car salesman.
Yet the reality is, that what you do is completely, 100% different than what a used car salesman does. I think understanding this, when the light came on and I realized, “You know what? I’m not like a used car salesman.” The job that I have is dynamically different. It’s not because, well, they sell cars and I sell houses. No, no, no, no. That’s not what’s different.
What’s different is the whole game of what your job is. So, think about it this way. If you sell rocks, pet rocks. I love pet rocks. So, there’s my pet rock here, and I’m going to sell it to you. Any type of sells, whether you’re selling used cars. Whether you’re selling pet rocks. Whether you’re selling vacations. Whether you’re selling life insurance, or whether you’re selling a pair of shoes at Nordstrom’s, or if you’re selling anything. Who do you represent? Who are you working for in sales? In any type of traditional sales, who are you working for? Answer. You’re working for the company. You’re working for the one that made the product, or you’re representing the product.
In other words, what you represent is what you are selling, not the one to whom you are selling it. But, in real estate, totally different. In real estate, there is no comparison at all. Real estate is almost the only sales job in the world, where you represent not what you are selling, but where you represent the person that you’re working with.
This is the client. Actually, this is a stuffed sock monkey, that my Mom made for me before I was born, and let’s just say it’s several decades old, but today this represents the client. This represents what you, as a real estate agent really, really do, and that is you don’t sell rock. You don’t sell houses. You represent clients.
Do you realize that’s what a real estate agent actually means? An agent is someone who acts, on behalf of another. That’s what the word agent is. An agent is someone who does something for the benefit, or on behalf of another, and that’s what you do. When you were getting your real estate license, they taught you about the law of agents, and they taught you about the fiduciary responsibility that you have. What is your fiduciary responsibility? To represent the person. You represent the person you are working with. You represent the client. You don’t represent the house. You don’t represent what you’re selling. You don’t even represent your company. You don’t represent your broker. You represent the client, and your broker represents the client.
We work for them. Real Estate agents work for the client, not for the product. If you’re selling a used car, you work for the used car dealer, or if you’re the dealer yourself, you work for the commission. You work for yourself. You represent yourself. Whether you sell life insurance, or whether you sell used cars, or video games, or computers, whatever other sales, or vacuum cleaners. It doesn’t matter. You represent the product, not the client.
Hopefully, it’s a product you believe in. It’s a great product, and it adds value to the customer, but you don’t really represent the customer. At the end of the day, your loyalty is to yourself, to your company, to the product you’re selling. But in real estate, it’s totally, totally different. Real estate is about the person you represent.
Why is that important? Because all of the approach to sales closing, all of the approach to selling stuff in real estate is different. Your ultimate highest job is not to close sales on people. Your highest job is to deliver great results, for the people that you represent. Which means, I’ve got a person here. I’ve got a client. I represent his, her, or their best interest. They want to sell their house. What’s my job? My job is not to sell them. My job is not just to sell the house. My job is to get the best result, which means to sell the house for the most amount of money, in the best amount of time, for the client, to protect them, to guide them, to fight for them, to represent them.
If I’m working with a buyer, I represent them. My job is not to sell them a house. My job is to represent them, and help them own a house, buy a house, and get them the best terms and price. It’s to represent their best interest. When you approach the game of real estate, and when you approach your work that way, and instead of it being about the rock, instead of it being about the house, or about the commission check, or about the sale, and it becomes about the person, everything changes. Everything changes from your mindset, from your heart, because your motivation changes, because no longer is it about you, because no longer is it about the house, no longer is it about the money. It becomes about the client.
I want to tell you, if there is one thing that will make you irresistible to the people that you want to represent. If you want more clients. If you want people to want to work with you, and to be more loyal to you, and you want more buyers and sellers to come your way, this is the magic. It’s when you care more about them, than you do about the thing you’re selling, and more than about the job, more than about the commission check. When it’s about the client. It is the only industry, where you actually represent the client, not the product, and not yourself. When you show up that way, people want to work with you. Make it about them, not about you. That’s the game changer, and when you do that, you can always expect yes.
Right little monkey? Right Oh.