In our Part 1 of “Negotiation 101 for Agents in Real Estate Marketing Philippines”, we covered the first 6 important concepts of how to improve your negotiation skills. Hopefully, since then, you’ve been able to not only try them, but now you’re perfecting them and are ready for Part 2!
So, here they are, Part 2 of 2, of the most powerful tips to help you become a top real estate sales agent by mastering not just the art, but also the science of negotiation, as well.
- ACCEPT ANY EMOTIONAL REACTIONS
In order to help someone, you can’t read their mind, right?
So, the same goes for negotiation. In order to identify what motivates someone, you’ve got to have your spiderman/woman-like senses turned on so that you could actively listen, at all times. Active listening is a key ingredient to creating successful negotiations so you’ve got to be open to hearing, seeing and observing ANY and ALL emotional reactions coming from your customer. There are several communication signals that customers will send you if you carefully observe their body language, their level of hostility or defensiveness, and their signs of being open-minded.
Any of these signals, whether positive or negative, will help you understand what your next steps are. - SILENCE IS GOOD
This is probably one of the hardest and most powerful skills for any real estate agent to master. Even the most experienced negotiators know how important silence is. By interrupting with the wrong comment or jumping in too early, you could redirect the conversation to the wrong topic or frustrate the customer by coming across as not listening to their needs.
Learn how to be comfortable with silence. As you’ve heard me say before, real estate is a person’s single largest purchase of their life so let a customer ponder their concerns before they give you an answer and DON’T RUSH IT! - PRE-EMPT OBJECTIONS
If you’re still new to real estate sales, you should know in advance that there are many common questions that pretty much every customer will ask. If you’re a seasoned veteran, you can probably anticipate some of the same questions that typically come up and at what stage.
So, either way, why not write them down, prepare or in some cases, share them with your prospect in advance?
By preparing for questions and your responses in advance, you’ll easily impress your client while giving them what they need to keep moving forward or to qualify out. And in return, you’ll be able to improve the speed and quality of the negotiation experience. - A “WAY OUT”
In order to have a successful negotiation, there can’t be a “winner” and a “loser”, if that is, you’re trying to create customers for life. Successful negotiations are about mutually positive outcomes. To get there, you gotta understand not only what the positive outcomes and negotiating points are but you also need to know how the customer prioritizes each one from a level of low to high importance.
On the other side of the coin, you need to also know what your positive outcomes and negotiating points are, as well as how they rank in importance.
By doing so, especially in large size and critical negotiation stages, you’ll be able to strategically know what you can give more of and what you can give less of. For example, everyone thinks that price is the most important thing that customers want to hammer you on but perhaps what’s more important to the customer is monthly payment terms or even better, lot location. If you ask the right questions, you can understand and explain to a customer that while you can’t negotiate the total price much, you can get them the lot that they want. So, the perceived value and importance of the lot location for a higher price and a lower but longer monthly payment will get you a higher commission and will give the customer what they REALLY want.
By knowing the different levels of importance of a customer’s negotiation points, you’ll be able to offer another negotiation point or “bargaining chip” in exchange for what you want in return. This is a great way to help your customer feel good about their purchase and the negotiation by using a “bargaining chip” in exchange for a way for them to save face and have a “way out” of a tough negotiation and move forward. - PIPELINE, PIPELINE, PIPELINE
Any poker players here?
If you don’t play poker, you should!
Now listen, I’m not condoning gambling but moreso the strategy behind the game of poker. Here’s what I mean…in poker, the person with the most chips/money has more leverage to force their opponent to either fold and not lose more money than what they’ve already bet or increase their bet and potentially lose more.
In sales, your pipeline or the amount of deals you can close for the month is equivalent to the number of chips/money you have when playing poker.
Why?
Well, when you have a lot of deals you can close in your pipeline for the month, you’re less compelled or less “desperate” to give away discounts just so you can close a deal.
So how do you increase your pipeline?
The more prospecting and the more marketing you do, the more leads you’ll get. The more leads you get, the more potential qualified opportunities you’ll have in your pipeline that could close. At the end and every month, you’ll have better negotiations since you won’t have as much pressure on your shoulders.
As I mentioned the last time, negotiation skills for agents are super important and there’s a lot that goes into it. By now, since you now have both the Part 1 and the Part 2 of “Negotiation 101 for Agents in Real Estate Marketing Philippines”, all you gotta do is prepare, practice and make it happen!
Looking to raise your game? If you’re a real estate professional in the Philippines and you’re passionate about getting the latest industry trends, and sales & marketing best practices, get more FREE tips and training here.
Dennis Velasco
Technology Evangelist super passionate about helping the industries of eCommerce, SMEs and real estate in the Philippines reach new levels of success.
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