Business history is filled with products that were invented for one purpose and wind up solving problems in a second unexpected area. Listerine mouthwash, for example, was originally envisioned as an antiseptic treatment for cuts and scratches. Coca-Cola was meant to treat headaches and anxiety. And believe it or not, the colorful children’s modeling clay, Play-Doh, was intended to be a new wallpaper cleaner!
Now, a savvy Atlanta real estate recruiter has found a new use for Mojo – as a tool to rapidly find competitive talent and hire them. Matt Broyles, the Business Development Director for Metro Brokers, a Better Homes and Garden affiliate with 1,700 agents in 25 offices around Greater Atlanta, uses the Mojo Triple Power Dialer to contact every agent/broker in the area to check if they are happy with their career trajectory.
“I’m looking to find agents who want to make a change,” he explains. “The top producers are happy where they are. I’m targeting talented people who feel like they are dying on the vine and falling through the cracks. We have a training program that pays a lot of attention to them and gets their business up and running fast.”
In a recent month, Broyles made 10,600 recruiting calls and he has an ever-changing list of more than 30,000 local agents. From March 2014 until the end of the year, he had actually talked with more than 17,000 agents. He avoids using scripts and focuses on one simple question: “Have you considered changing real estate companies now or in the near future?”
“They’re either going to be interested or not, so I churn and burn. I don’t care about the total number of calls I make. I care about the number of appointments and hires,” Broyles says. “It’s the same thing in real estate. Listening to the phone ring doesn’t close deals.”
Out of those 17,000 live calls with Atlanta agents, Broyles has hired 50 people in less than a year. “Fifty people is an entire real estate office,” he notes. “And we turn those agents into top producers with our X-celerater training program. We give them the tools, resources and support to succeed, everything from coaching, sales training and marketing support to leads and assistance with their websites and SEO. The average agent sells three homes a year. Our new agents alone sell twice that many in their first year using our system.”
A 20-year-veteran of selling real estate (at Metro since 2006), Broyles previously found Mojo invaluable for making prospecting calls to his Expired, Just Listed, Just Sold and FSBO prospects. The purpose of his phone calls may have changed, but the tools are still equally effective.
“Point blank, I can’t make my calls without Mojo. I’d rather be shot – and I’m not kidding,” he says. “I’m no different than any real estate agent. If you’re going to be making phone calls, you lose a lot of money by not using Mojo – and I don’t get paid to say that.”
Broyles worked as a bartender when he first got his real estate license in 1993. He was inspired by cassette tapes of pioneer real estate coach Mike Ferry.
“I never looked back,” he recalls. “In the beginning of my career, I helped a local RE/MAX agent go from 50 to 100 deals a year for four years straight just by making cold calls eight hours a day. Another top 10 RE/MAX agent approached me and I helped them go from 100 to 200 deals a year for six years straight. And there was no such thing as Mojo back then.”
“I was hand dialing two phones at the same time with a double headset,” Broyles adds. “I had an ear piece on each ear and a microphone on each side of my mouth. It was absolutely excruciating. Needless to say, Mojo is now the most valuable tool in my business.”
Prospecting Advice
Based on his 21 years of prospecting experience, Broyles offers the following advice for real estate agents new to making cold calls:
- Don’t Rely on Voice Mail – “I don’t believe in leaving recorded messages. You don’t make appointments by talking to voice mail. You don’t want to give them another way to avoid you. If I’m dealing with a client, it’s a different story, but I’d rather keep trying back to get a live conversation if possible.”
- Internalize Your Script – “The key is practicing your scripts by making tons of phone calls until they become natural conversations. You don’t need to memorize lines, but just have to know how to ask the right questions. I’m looking for motivated people. When I find I have a rapport with someone, then I can set up an appointment.”
- Know When to Move On – “You have to get good at the dance. Get answers, set an appointment or move on as quickly as possible. My old goal was trying to do business with everyone. But you’ll go crazy because you’re not going to do business with everyone, so stop trying. Stop trying to bang square pegs into the round hole.”
“Even though I’ve been making calls for 21 years, I’m still learning everyday. It’s always new for me. And the thing that makes Mojo so awesome is that it takes the monotony out of making calls,” Broyles says. “You can easily burn out quickly in this business, but Mojo helps me have more conversations and stay engaged in the process.”
