Commercial Investment Real Estate is the magazine of the CCIM Institute, the leading provider of commercial real estate education. CIRE covers market trends, current developments, and business strategies within the commercial real estate field.
Issue link: http://cire.epubxp.com/i/128835
One common thread links the newest CCIM candidate to the most seasoned commercial real estate veteran: the need to acquire new clients and maintain existing relationships. Without clients, you don't have a business, so prospecting is the lifeblood of any brokerage frm. And the most efective way to turn prospects into clients is to pick up the phone and have a conversation with them. Te brokerage business has a three-part cycle: You enter the business cycle by going to the market to fnd prospects with whom to do business. Once you have found a prospect, you analyze their needs, make a presentation, and win the right to represent them. Of course, winning the business isn't enough, since you also need to fulfll the assignment and close the deal. All these steps are important, but many brokers place their emphasis on the win and fulfll stages. To keep your brokerage pipeline healthy, you need to always keep re-entering the cycle by fnding new prospects. Tis keeps all three buckets in your brokerage continuum full. Eadweard Muybridge/Getty Images Building a Prospect List Before you pick up the phone, develop a solid strategy based on two essential elements: determining who your prospect is and what you are going to say. You can have the best list in the market, but if you cannot clearly articulate the purpose of your call and the value to your audience, your great list is worthless. Alternately, you can have a silver tongue and deliver consistently, but if your calling list is outdated and not validated, you are not any better of than the broker in the frst situation. Start by defning your target market. Your target market depends on how you see your business. If you're a tenant representative in a small market, you might need to talk to every ofce user in the market. But if you're working in a major metro area, you might focus CCIM.com exclusively on CPA frms that take 10,000 or more square feet of space in class A buildings in the central business district. Te more specifc you can make your market, the easier it will be to prospect synergistically. However, you also want to have enough opportunity to meet your earnings goals, so don't make your target market too small. Te next step is to determine whom to call. When building your prospecting database, try to only include the most qualifed prospects. Ralph Spencer, CCIM, a principal of Innovative Learning in Orlando, Fla., ofers a list of attributes of qualifed prospects: • needs commercial real estate services; • knows he needs commercial real estate services; • has the authority to act on his need; • has the budget to back up his authority; • feels a sense of urgency to act; • knows your company and has had a positive experience in the past; • knows you and likes and trusts you; and • is willing to follow your guidance. Te more attributes that a person has, the May | June | 2013 35