Real Estate Lead Generation: Is Cold Calling the Answer?

What is Cold Calling and How Can it Benefit Real Estate Agents? 

“Cold calling” is the act of contacting someone by phone or in person seemingly off-the-cuff. As you’ll see below, there’s actually quite a bit of preparation that goes into a successful cold call. Although many real estate agents have been slow to adopt cold calling to garner new clients, according to Just Call, it is the most proven method of lead generation in the real estate industry. Cold calling offers several advantages.  

Leads are an important facet of building your real estate business. Cold calling offers the ability to not only connect with potential clients but also other agents, and property owners, and can help you learn pertinent information about the market in a specific area. Placing cold calls can also help you get listings before other real estate agents have the opportunity. And finally, direct contact with prospects is a strong way to promote yourself. Even if you don’t get a listing from a call, that lead now knows who you are and what you have to offer.  

Tips for Successful Cold Calling as a Real Estate Agent 

Those who have been cold calling for a while are probably comfortable with speaking to anyone, but for those testing the waters, the practice can be intimidating. The easiest way to wade into cold calling is to craft scripts for the types of calls you plan to make. There’s a general framework for writing a compelling and concise cold calling script that entails five key elements: goals, attitude, empathy, questions, and value.  

Goals 

No plan will work without being clear about the goal. There are many types of sales calls so before you start to craft your script, decide which target you want to meet. Do you just want to introduce yourself, or are you trying to get listings? Knowing your goal will make the call go much smoother. 

Attitude 

It’s important to be polite and respectful in your communications with leads. You also want to present yourself with an enthusiastic and positive attitude. Even if you aren’t totally comfortable with cold calling yet, sounding upbeat and eager about working with them sends a positive message to prospects. 

Empathy 

In sales, empathy is a key tool in building trust with leads and clients. When trust is present, relationship-building is much easier. During your calls, listen intently to your leads’ concerns, and show that you understand their pain points and genuinely want to help them solve the problems they face.  

Questions 

When you place your calls, make sure you aren’t dominating the conversation. Yes, you ultimately want to sell yourself and your services, but relationship-building should also be at the forefront. In addition to asking them about their real estate concerns, ask them about themselves. Questions such as, “How long have you lived in the area?” and “What do you like most about this community?” serve a dual purpose of getting to know more about the prospect and learning things you may not know about the location.  

Value 

Finally, the most successful pitches show the prospect that you can help them in some way – aka, your value. There’s nothing wrong with a little self-promotion, as long as it’s done skillfully.  

Crafting a Clear Cold Calling Script 

When you cold call, every second matters. Writing a clear and concise script will help ensure that you make effective use of your time and offer a general framework for how the call should flow. Although you should feel free to add your own elements, a good call should include the following: 

Introduction 

The introduction is arguably the most important part of the call because, for many people, this is when they’ll decide whether or not to hear you out. You should begin your call by greeting the prospect using their name and giving them your full name and where you work. From there, you can take a couple of approaches to continue the conversation. 

You may go with something more classic such as asking for a moment of their time. Another option is to remind them of how you got their information. For example, if you’re calling someone who placed a contact request on your website, you may lead with, “I’m calling because I noticed you requested some information on my website (say name of website).” 

Establish Rapport 

Try to connect with your prospect by asking open-ended questions about their lives. From a real estate perspective, this can entail what they like about the area, their opinion on new developments in the neighborhood, or even their work life.  

Positioning Statement 

The positioning statement is a brief description of your services and how they are suited to the lead. This is when you’ll hear about their pain points and other information regarding how you may be of assistance to them.  

Schedule an Appointment for Follow Up 

Once you’ve gotten a general understanding of your prospect’s pain points and how you can help them, it’s time to schedule a follow-up. Briefly summarize what they’ve told you and propose another time when you can meet for a more detailed discussion.  

Best Practices for Making Calls 

After you’ve determined which leads will receive which calls, it’s time to go for it. These tips will help make cold calling easier: 

Practice your calls beforehand. If possible, have a friend or colleague role play with you. 

Place the call in a space free of distractions that could interfere with its cadence. 

Engender calmness for yourself and the lead by speaking at a steady pace and with empathy. 

Be well-versed in your objection responses. 

Stick to soft selling as opposed to hard selling. 

Real Estate Agents Who Have Succeeded with Cold Calling 

Brett Tanner – a real estate agent and investor – and his team made $170M in 2013 by honing in on the art of connecting with leads. He integrated cold calling into his lead generation strategy and credits it as part of what has led to his success. Tanner initially used door-knocking as his go-to method, but soon realized that while he could knock on, say, 30-40 doors over a three-hour time frame, cold calling would allow him to connect with about 300 homeowners in the same amount of time.  

Prospecting by phone grew his business from a company of one to a brokerage employing 20 agents. Several of those agents just cold call for three hours each day, and in one year his agents sold over 2,500 homes. 

Tanner advises a balancing a consultative approach with aiming for an appointment as the best method for cold calling. “We’re really pushing for the appointment right when they call and then adding value. So, I would definitely say you want to balance it out. I think there’s a place for it. But if you are calling brand new expired listings and you’re going to try a real slow, soft approach, I will tell you it will not work,” he explained.  

Tanner said it’s important to understand that no matter how an agent gets leads, eventually, they will have to get on the phone. The more calls an agent makes, the more contacts and referrals they will get, and that will translate into income. Tanner suggested tracking numbers (number of calls, appointments made, etc.), and working off of a base script instead of attempting to play the conversation by ear.  

Integrating Cold Calling Into Your Real Estate Lead Generation Plan 

Using different modes of lead generation is important for real estate agents. One of the biggest benefits is that you’ll still have access to a consistent flow of leads when there is a shortage or slowdown with another method. Not being dependent on only one source of leads allows you to conduct business from a place of plenty instead of scarcity. If you need to revamp a part of your system, you have other options.  

In practice, integrating cold calling into your lead generation plan involves gathering a database of qualified leads from all the channels used. Use social media (i.e., LinkedIn or Facebook), website inquiries or comments, email lists, and any other sources of leads to segment prospects by their position in the sales funnel. You can then use this to determine which script will be most effective when you call them. For example, someone who may have clicked on a pop-up ad is earlier in the sales funnel than someone who requested a quote. Your approach for these two leads will be distinct.  

Remember that even if you have a perfectly crafted script, you must be flexible enough to allow the natural flow of the conversation to determine what you say. Do not be so committed to your script that you miss key opportunities to have relationship-building interactions with prospective clients.  

Recap: Is Cold Calling a Viable Strategy for Real Estate Agents? 

Cold calling integrated with other modalities is a viable strategy for real estate agents. Although it will take more work than social media marketing, your next client could be only one cold call away. The key considerations to make when implementing cold calling are to make sure you have a database of accurate information, having a variety of strong scripts for each type of lead, and considering a customer relationship management (CRM) system to keep all of your leads organized.