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What does it take to run a successful real estate business? If you have your own agency or are pondering the prospect of launching one, that’s a very good question to ask.
But often, the answer that comes back is overly complicated, when in reality it can be whittled down to two essential ingredients that underpin any agency’s success.
Quite simply, they are systems and people. After that, the rest of the business tends to fall into place.
The significance of systems
They’re not exactly the “glamourous” side of real estate, but the reality is that much of what every real estate agent and agency does each day is process-driven.
It involves making calls, adding details to databases, scheduling appointments, meeting with people, marketing properties, launching sales campaigns, taking rental applications, scheduling routine inspections, and finalising the paperwork for a property sale or rental.
Each of these individual tasks is often repeated day in and day out. And that’s where systems come into their own. A system should be applied to any task or activity that’s repeated.
And the advantages of applying these systems are numerous.
When you create a system for an activity, you enable efficiency. You also remove variables and create consistency within your business, and consistency allows for excellence.
It enables you to set expectations that your team can consistently meet using systems that ensure a great client experience.
But perhaps most importantly, systems allow a business to scale. They remove the guesswork, and ensure your entire team is on the same page when it comes to what should happen, when, and who is responsible for that task.
However, like anything in business, systems aren’t something that you can set and forget. As your business evolves and grows, the systems behind it will need to be altered, tweaked, and improved.
The importance of people
As good as your systems are and as process-driven as your business might be, it’s the people who use these systems and processes that are paramount.
People provide the human factor. They are the warm, friendly voice on the end of the phone, the expert they meet in person, and the trusted property adviser that clients remember.
The people within the business give life to the system and create the human element.
So, while you might have a great system in place that ticks all the boxes of a property settlement process, it’s the person who calls and delivers the news that a sale has gone unconditional that creates the human connection.
People bring a care factor that no system or piece of technology can replace. They bring the touchpoints that clients emotionally connect with and remember.
Systems and people don’t just happen.
Having a business with good systems and great people makes for a formidable combination. Together, they allow you to deliver excellence, time and again, and that has the potential to make a business unbeatable.
But neither happens by chance. Systems and people require meticulous and deliberate attention. They require ongoing care. Systems need tweaking, revision, and refinement. People need leadership, training, mentoring and opportunities for advancement.
To move your business from good to great and then phenomenal, continually refine your systems and place the right people in the right roles with the right attitude.
Remember, you can’t “shrink yourself to greatness”. You need a team around you. And that team needs solid and proven systems so they too can grow to their full potential.
Manos Findikakis is the CEO of Agents’Agency
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