Weekly Sales Tips: Networking in New Home Sales
You’re in sales so you love networking right? Maybe, but not always the case I’m guessing. I’ve met plenty of sales professionals that didn’t like networking. It wasn’t until they changed how they viewed networking, myself included here, that it became much easier and more efficient.
Your perspective on networking means everything. Let’s talk about networking in new home sales. I know we have a lot of sales pros who watch our videos and read our blog who are not in new home sales but hang in there, I still think you can benefit from this.
I’ll be the first to admit I’ve never been a big fan of networking. That is until I changed my way of looking at it. I saw networking the wrong way. I always had this picture in my mind of networking being about meeting somebody in a conference or a hotel lobby and then grabbing a business card and shaking their hand and saying, “Hi, I’m Jeff Shore and I’m in sales.” We just have sort of that icky feeling when it comes to networking if that’s the way we feel about it, right? It just kind of feels gross.
What changed my mind, was to think about the approach this way when it comes to networking. Am I palms up or am I palms down? Palms up means it’s receiving, I want something from you. Gimme, gimme, gimme. Palms down means that I’m giving something to you. That’s the change for me. That made networking a completely different objective. Am I palms up or am I palms down? Am I taking or am I giving?
It’s no surprise that today networking is a regular part of my life. I just got back from the International Homebuilders show and it was wonderful, marvelous, and had such a good time. I’ve had several networking calls in the last few weeks with people that I’ve never met before. Authors, speakers, trainers, and people I have always wanted to talk to. I always walk away with a fresh perspective and the fact is, networking is an increasingly important part of my life and in my career.
But why should you bother with networking, especially if you’re in new home sales? Well, there are really two reasons for this.
Generating New Business
This may sound like a taking perspective, but the question I would challenge you with is how do you give, first? How do you serve, first? How do you earn the opportunity to receive, because you first gave? That’s where we want to start this conversation.
Adding New Connections in Your Life
John Maxwell once said that you’re no different ten years from now than you are today, except for the books you read and the people that you meet. This is a great opportunity for us simply to grow. To grow our connections, to grow our knowledge, to grow by learning from the people around us.
How do you do that? Where do you do that? Well, there are lots of opportunities out there. There might be peer groups within home sales talking to people who do the same thing that you do. I just happen to know of an online community specifically designed for residential real estate sales professionals where you can start networking and giving right now. Head on over to Sales365 and join for FREE! I’m there on a daily basis and would love to hear from you.
Some people are concerned about sharing state secrets. I’m not. I’m interested in working with other people to make them better so that I can be better at working with them. That’s an abundance mentality. If I look at it and say well I don’t want to give away all my secrets, that’s a scarcity mentality.
You can also work with peer groups outside of home sales. This might be even more beneficial. You have the opportunity to work with people who don’t know a lot about what it is that you do. You’ll get to meet people whom you don’t know a lot about what they do.
There’s a completely different perspective when you’re talking to someone who sells cars or insurance or jewelry. Learn the questions from their approach, learn about their struggles, and learn about how they deal with those different issues. We get so limited in our own little world, and networking takes us out of that.
Your assignment this week is to serve someone. Just serve and see where it goes from there. Reach out to someone, get over your discomfort, and reach out to say, “Hey, I just want to chat a little bit. Let’s just spend a few minutes getting to know each other. I can learn about what you do. You can learn about what I do, and we’ll just chat for a little while.”
That’s it. That’s what networking is. Always ask the question, how can I serve that person? How can I make that person more successful? That is the ultimate goal of networking. Until next time my friends learn more earn more.
