Strategies for Developing Top Performers in Your Brokerage

It seems like some people are just born to be real estate agents, doesn’t it? They are overflowing with unparalleled charisma and they possess an innate ability to generate and nurture leads. They’re walking, talking marketing machines that seem to pick up new clients everywhere they go. They almost make it look easy.

Of course, it’s not easy. For every “natural” real estate pro you can think of, there are scores and scores of licensees who can’t seem to get their brand and their business off the ground. They completed their required prelicensing education and passed their licensing exam. Some of them even did exceptionally well in both of those endeavors. However now, they find themselves unable to gain a foothold in this competitive business.

Chances are, if you run a brokerage, your roster includes a select few agents who are naturals, a lot of agents in that second category we described, and a small group who fall somewhere in between.

Yet all of those agents entered this business expecting to be in the first group. You also had high hopes for each of them when they chose to hang their license with your brokerage. You’ll likely never be able to have a complete roster of superstar real estate agents. But how much more successful could your brokerage be if you could elevate those mid-level agents to superstar status, and get even half of your underperformers to a place where they could at least earn a living and stay in this business?

The strategies we’ll cover in this article can get you there. They’re not simple. They aren’t quick fixes. They will require time, effort, and a shift in the culture of your brokerage. But putting them into action will empower of your agents to be more successful, and make your brokerage the kind of organization agents want to work with and stay with.  

The best thing you can do for your newly or recently licensed agents is help them understand what the naturals seem to already know.

They need a business plan with real goals and tangible strategies to reach them.

They need a marketing plan to help them develop a unique value proposition and communicate it effectively and consistently.

Many of them are not used to working independently and being paid by commission. They need an income plan to understand how to manage their personal and business finances, especially early in their career when pay days are fewer and farther between.

They’re motivated. They’re willing to work hard. They need to understand what type of activity to apply themselves to in order to get traction and accelerate the growth of their new business.

Some national brokerages arm their agents quite well to be successful. But in most, this type of activity isn’t prioritized. It’s a trial by fire, sink or swim approach where the best rise to the top and the worst leave the business and are replaced by new, equally ill-equipped, agents in a continuous cycle.  

Helping your agents bridge the gap between earning a license and actually being successful in real estate isn’t just good for them. It’s good for your brokerage. If your entire team’s production rose even 10% over the course of a year, what would that do for your bottom line? If you could drastically reduce agent turnover, what would that save you in onboarding time and expenses? It’s possible.  

Beyond initial training, the best thing you can do to arm your agents for long-term success is to offer coaching services. Coaching is not teaching. Teaching is designed to transfer knowledge. Coaching is designed to help your agents become better decision makers and problem solvers, ultimately building their ability to become more effective agents.

Coaching is so effective in developing strong real estate pros because it’s based in reality. Coaches work with agents to understand an actual situation or obstacle they’re dealing with, and empower them to overcome it themselves. Where teaching often aims to provide an answer, coaching recognizes that the right answer is situational. It helps the agent develop the ability to apply the right solution based on the situation.

As agents work with a coach to develop, they become better at solving for specific situations they’re facing. Problem solving and decision making start to feel natural. They develop a stronger “gut feel” that’s been honed by thousands of data points they’ve gathered over time through personal experience. Well-coached agents, over time, become autonomous earners for themselves and the brokerage they work for.

Building a curriculum that will be effective in elevating the long-term performance of your team simply isn’t something every brokerage is armed to take on. The good news is, you don’t have to. There are existing programs that you can use to guide you in the process. Dearborn, for instance, has developed two programs designed to help you .

Real Estate Accelerator is a two-day intensive bootcamp program aimed at helping you arm your agents with the business building skills and critical operating activities utilized by the nation’s most successful real estate agents.

Full Throttle Coaching is an intensive program we’ve created to help your agents continually learn, practice and perform the activities that will make them profitable and successful throughout their career. Dearborn offers on-demand video coaching modules, as well as materials to support you in providing in-person coaching for your teams.    

However you choose to approach it, you have the opportunity to improve the performance of your entire agent roster if you’re committed to the growth of your people and your brokerage. Real estate is not an easy business to compete in. But with the right support, you can ensure that your agents’ success isn’t left up to chance.