Back in the early days of my career, I was told to place five business cards next to my car keys each night before I went to bed. The idea was that I had to meet five new people each day and give them my business card and get their contact information…before I could come home!
It’s actually simple math. If I had actually done that for each day that I worked in my business I would have added over 1,200 new contacts to my database in one year’s time.
Here is the math. 5 cards a day times a 5 day work week equals 25 new contacts a week. Assuming that I took off two weeks for vacation (That didn’t happen, but work with me) that left 50 weeks a year times 25 contacts per week which equals 1,250 new people into my database in one year’s time.
If you take a conservative estimate that 1% will sell or buy a house, and then further assume that I could only capture half that amount, we are looking at 6 transactions a year! From passing out 5 cards a day to strangers.
Fast forward to today when we are in house arrest. How can you replace the face to face opportunities that physically handing out business cards creates?
By following my 5 by 4 plan.
Using this plan you can create 20 “touches” a day without ever leaving your house!
Let’s break it down step by step.
- Make Five calls to your database every day. I’ve covered this before, but we have the perfect opportunity to call every one we know, even the ones that we haven’t talked to in years. Just call them and ask how are they doing! Offer to help. Offer to get the something that they need. Just be there to listen. And you can always offer to include them on your real estate newsletter!
- Send Five Text Messages a day. Same idea here as phoning, but this time it will be much shorter, but in the same vein as the call. “How are you doing? Need anything? Can I help in any way?”
- Send 5 emails per day. You can be a bit more verbose in an email than you can with text messages and you can include photos or short videos too. But, it’s just a variation on the same theme.
- Write 5 Thank you notes per day. There are always people in your life that you can thank for a kindness extended to you. Look for them and write those notes. Reflect back on your life, who did something for you that didn’t get properly thanked? Write them a note and mail it. I can assure you that this gesture will not go un-noticed!
So there you have it. 20 touches per day is the goal. Do what you can to reach out. These little bits of care and concern on your part will go a long way to lifting someone’s spirits.
I believe that people may not remember what you did for them, but they will remember how you made them feel.
And some of these people will do a real estate transaction with you in the future! After all, some of them are finding out that they need a bigger house, or a bigger yard! Some will divorce and need to sell. And who knows what other societal changes this crisis will cause. I can also assure you that real estate will always be a need.
Do the work and reap the benefits. Or do nothing and reap the consequences. It really is that simple!
