Evidence shows that agents perform better when they participate in regular sales meetings with real estate meeting topics functioning to foster accountability and a culture of growth. Brian Curtis at Arkansas-based Curtis Realty Group has raised his lead-conversion rate 2 percentage points thanks to productive meetings.
Suppose you doubt the effectiveness of weekly meetings or know your meetings are subpar. In that case, we have some tips for improvement and testimonials that showcase just how much productivity and company culture can improve with the right meeting strategies.
Why is meeting with your agents important?
Real estate team meetings may seem like they take unnecessary time away from doing business with clients, but they're an important part of building growth. Businesses that focus on relationships (essentially what real estate is all about) need to regularly check in with their team so they feel their hard work is not going unnoticed.
Curaytor co-founder and sales mastermind Chris Smith says, “successful sales depend on a winning mindset and constant effort. These require consistent reinforcement and encouragement from sales managers, and sales meetings provide the arena for them to cultivate these skills.”
But everyone knows meetings aren’t always effective. Managers must be organized and keep their team’s needs front of mind.
Tips for running agent team meetings
Productive meetings follow a structure and Neal Mitchell, a salesman at Curaytor, attests to the efficacy of a systematic approach. He “appreciates knowing they’ll be giving regular feedback” and when tweaks are offered as suggestions for improvement, this gives him extra confidence.
Whether the individuals on your team are working with buyers or sellers, these meetings are great opportunities for agents to report on things like new buyer agency agreements signed, pending contracts, and closings.
1. Don't disrupt the day
No one likes endless meetings that interrupt workflow. Scheduling meetings at a time when your real estate agents aren’t likely to be annoyed at having their productivity disturbed is important. That’s why having a meeting in the morning, at the beginning of the week, will allow your team to devote the rest of the week to their marketing strategies, selling houses for their clients, and closing deals.
2. Remote meetings are easy
Rising in popularity since the pandemic, virtual meetings offer agents the opportunity to either tune in while at home or on the road. Easy to record, they can be accessed on the cloud at any time for employees to review or watch at their convenience. When holding zoom meetings, be sure to take full advantage of the visual capabilities by using video and imagery rather than relying on dull, text-based PowerPoint slides.
3. Always follow up after the meeting
A follow-up e-mail with key points and highlights will ensure vital information gets to your agents who may have been too busy to watch the full recording. Excited language, a few well-designed graphics, and even short, embedded video clips can drum up excitement for next week’s meeting. When you go beyond the standard follow-up email template, and generate some anticipation and FOMO (fear of missing out), attendance at next week’s meeting could be up substantially.
4. Circulate notes
Before and after meetings, circulate notes to your team. Sharing the agenda ahead of time lets everyone know what will be covered. Circulating notes after the meeting highlights the importance of what was discussed. Especially useful is a section that includes questions that came up during the meeting. Notes can also include especially inspiring agent stories and recognition to those who are high performers within the company.
5. Encourage agent participation
Effective meeting give the team plenty of opportunity to speak, share marketing strategies and take accountability. In most corporate weekly meetings, sales reps take turns reporting on their regions. For meetings conducted by real estate brokerages, each member of the team should be listed on the agenda to encourage accountability and participation.
6. Keep up the pace
According to The Close, it’s a good idea for real estate brokerages to keep their team meetings 20% content and 80% entertainment. Overloading agents with details doesn’t generate interest, inspire productivity, or spark new ideas. Don’t allow the meeting to drag or get bogged down with anything that could be conveyed over e-mail.
7. Always set an agenda
A simple, updated task list of what will be covered in weekly meetings can help keep people focused and contribute to a quicker pace. The list of agenda items can be e-mailed ahead of time, passed out during the meeting, or shown on the presentation's first slide.
8. Never be the smartest in the room
A good leader facilitates participation and fosters an engaged culture, but isn’t doing all the talking. Chances are, your team has their own sales meetings ideas to share and can deliver actionable sales advice to fellow agents. Solicit tips and a list of topics from your group to foster buy-in.
9. Keep your meeting time consistent
If the weekly meeting is always the same day and same time, more members of your team will be able to remember, schedule for it, and attend.
10. Send an email instead
For individual questions and discussions with specific team members, send an e-mail so you don't waste the social setting on issues that could be handled one-on-one.
The greatest team meeting structure
This is the meeting structure utilized by Curaytor. Curaytor’s sales meetings were inspired, in part, by this 1-800-Got-Junk sales meeting that went viral.
- 10-15 minutes, review the numbers. The team analyzes their performance relative to monthly sales goals. If ahead, Smith and the team look for ways to perform even better; if behind, they discuss ways to improve.
- 10-15 minutes, one sales lesson. Smith brings a specific lesson about sales to each meeting. At a recent meeting he relayed his experience of choosing a swimming pool provider (over three others) for his Orlando home at a recent sales meeting. The winning firm presented a custom video slideshow showing how Smith’s house and landscape would look with the pool in place. Takeaway: Curaytor salespeople should place prospects’ photos and branding in demo Curaytor websites before the sale.
- 10-15 minutes, feedback and group coaching. The team recaps what they learned and how they will (or have) implemented changes and what the results have been. Smith provides real-time coaching to each team member, providing sales insights to everyone and allowing the sales team to coach each other when appropriate.
- 10-15 minutes, trickle & pop. Smith highlights what the firm is doing to bring the team leads (a marketing pop) and then reinforces that the firm expects the team to consistently sign new clients each day (trickle). Too many sales and marketing divisions are fractured and unappreciative of what the other does so Smith ensures that doesn't happen at Curaytor.
Team meeting and training ideas
Here’s a few sales meeting ideas you can implement to make your meetings more electrifying:
1. Guest speakers
Allowing others to lead the group and share tips can make a meeting more dynamic. Consider selecting volunteer team members to be guest speakers and provide actionable sales advice from their personal experience in the field. If recorded, this can even become an interesting video series you could share on your YouTube channel.
2. Gamify your office
Set benchmarks and use meeting times to reward sales performance. Upbeat music paired with rewards, prizes, and social recognition can create a fun, competition-like atmosphere to motivate your team.
3. Recruit coaches
Professional outside coaches can be invited to meetings to conduct trainings on topics related to social selling, alternatives to cold calling, and nurturing happy clients. Many motivational speakers and trainers are available for hire and can inspire new enthusiasm in your team.
4. Roleplay
Meetings are an opportunity to role play and provide feedback on sales strategies, sales skills, and negotiations. Brainstorm typical concerns potential clients might have about the current real estate market and have your team role play how they handle tricky conversations.
5. Speak with the top-performing agents
Using the meeting time to interview top-performers so they can share their success stories, techniques, and personal experience can be an engaging training opportunity that will foster aspirational goals for others in your team.
Real estate meeting agenda (template)
Team size: 10 agents (five listing and five buyer’s agents), one transaction coordinator and one listing and marketing manager.
Location: Bentonville, Arkansas
Meetings: Daily meetings (15/30 minutes, everyday at 7:30am), Weekly meetings (Wednesday mornings, one hour), Monthly team-building get-together.
Date of first meeting: May 2015
Results: Increased conversion rate (up 2 percent), productivity and camaraderie
Team member buy-in: The team provides leads, training, transaction management and a customer relationship management platform. Given the support, “it just makes sense to be a part of the meetings,” said team leader Brian Curtis.
Last May, Curaytor client Brian Curtis began holding daily sales meetings. He will never turn back.
“We feed off each other,” Curtis said of the team dynamic generated through the meetings. He gave an example: a team member recently shared that he made 117 calls the previous day, which raised the team’s competitive juices, inspiring everyone to work smarter and harder.
Curtis holds the daily meeting at a sandman-early 7:30 a.m. It has three purposes:
- To keep the team’s transaction coordinator in the loop on all deals to minimize last-minute hiccups and unforeseen rush jobs.
- To ensure everybody’s awake. "If you’re not hitting the business day hard by 9 a.m., you’re not going to be successful," Curtis said.
- To coach the team up. Most real estate deals can be boiled down to seven or eight scenarios, and Curtis’ nearly decade of real estate experience allows him to quickly assess the sticky issues that arise within his team, resolve them quickly and efficiently coach his team up in the process.
Eight months ago, Curtis added in one-hour weekly meetings to focus more on training. Given the industry’s low barrier to entry, he said, the weekly meetings allow him to offer quality, consistent sales coaching.
In addition to the daily and weekly meetings, Curtis also takes his team and their significant others on an evening outing once a month to forge bonds on an informal level. They’ve gone bowling, done an escape room and enjoyed a pizza dinner. The roughly $300 is well worth the camaraderie it engenders, Curtis said.
Curtis has embraced his coaching role. “There are too many team owners and not enough team leaders,” Curtis said.
Team size: Four agents (team leaders Rick Raanes and his wife and two buyer’s agents) and one admin.
Location: The Woodlands, Texas
Meetings: Daily meetings (15 minutes, everyday at 8:00 a.m.), Weekly meetings (Monday mornings, one hour), Weekly training
Date of first meeting: December 2015
Results: Increased conversion rate, accountability, focus, stronger identity, adherence to Rockstar Realty Group brand.
Team member buy-in: “Those who control the leads, control the meetings,” said Raanes jokingly. “We have a good time, they want to come.”
Last year, leads were slipping through Curaytor client Rick Raanes’ team’s cracks. Raanes leads the four-agent Rockstar Realty Group team with his wife in The Woodlands, Texas.
Since instituting weekly sales meetings six months ago, the team has become much more thorough and consistent. Conversion rate, accountability, focus and tighter adherence to the brand guidelines have all shot up, Raanes said.
The meetings have also improved culture. “From a unity standpoint they’ve been dynamite,” Raanes said.
The one-hour weekly meetings comprise:
- 15 minutes of success stories: how training has been implemented and the results.
- A few minutes for sales script work, including those in outlined by Chris Smith in his new, best-selling book, “The Conversion Code.”.
- 15 minutes on the week plan: what listings are coming up, if the team needs to order more Swag or other team details. This helps the team proactively reach out to clients, something Raanes feels is critical.
- 30 minutes of training based on Curaytor’s weekly “Refresh” course or the Conversion Code.
Curaytor hosts a one-hour Refresh webinar each week designed to help its clients optimize their businesses.
Raanes strongly encourages attendance at the meetings, excusing agents only if they’re on vacation. (However, his agents aren’t W-2 employees, so, of course, they have the option of declining the meetings, but Raanes said enthusiasm remains high for them).
Rockstar’s morning “huddle,” as Raanes calls it, starts daily at 8 a.m. and runs for approximately 10 minutes. It follows a “2-2-2” format: two minutes to share two things they did great yesterday and two things they’re going to focus on that day.
The daily meetings, started in mid-April, have dramatically improved team member focus and accountability, Raanes said.
“From a unity standpoint (our meetings) have been dynamite,” said Rick Raanes.
Raanes also leads a Thursday “happy hour," where he orders pizza and he and the team’s two buyer’s agents refine their systems and call clients.
Editor’s note: Rick Raanes hired Curaytor in February to simplify his team’s websites, generate leads and help refine his team’s lead follow-up process.
Why did you hire Curaytor? I really love what Chris and Jimmy are putting together. I was putting so much time into a WordPress site and it looked nice. However, I was not getting the leads that I wanted or doing the proper follow up. I also wanted to grow our team, and this was a great way to create a higher level of accountability. I love the clean lines of the site. It is very simple.
What has it done for your business? I don't have to spend the time playing with the WordPress site. I can also get back to doing what I do best: networking in the community.
What is your favorite feature of the system? My two buyers agents love Curaytor’s customer relationship management platform Follow Up Boss.
What is it allowing you to focus on now? I can focus on getting leads for my team, knowing that we have two great agents who can convert them. It has been such a great addition to what we are doing.
