This Spring, Inman is obsessing over helping you to tune-up your business, with actionable insights, the best advice from top agents, and hundreds of helpful stories from all over the world. Interested in sharing your advice and insights with us? Reach out to me at matthew@inman.com.
Don’t forget that we’ll also be focusing on how agents and brokerages can all move Faster, Better, Together this July at Inman Connect San Francisco. Not got your ticket yet? Buy them here, and remember that Select members get a $100 discount. Thinking of bringing your team? There are special onsite perks and discounts when you buy those tickets together too. Just contact us to find out more.
We recently had the opportunity to chat with Kristina Gershteyn, an agent out of Staten Island, New York. Kristina shared with us her unique approach to networking, what she does to win listings as a daily habit and how she never pays for leads.
What are the three most effective things you do every day to grow your business?
1. Always seek networking opportunities with industry leaders in our community. That means reaching out to our sphere of connections and inviting them to get together, grab a coffee, with the idea of sharing advice or just simply asking, “how can I help you and your business grow?” This creates a deeper relationship and builds rapport.
Our team likes to meet with other agents in our area as well, to discuss local market conditions and share general information with like-minded people. This helps us learn about the market and makes for a smooth transaction if we ever do business together.
2. Log into our customer relationship manager (CRM). Every. Single. Day. This helps us stay in touch with our past clients, follow up with current ones and stay relevant with long term prospects.
3. Social media. It is a great way to connect with local residents and even with an audience on a national level. It takes discipline, management skills and planning ahead, but it can help others create a deep emotional connection to your brand.
There’s no place like home…Staten Island, New York
What tactics do you use for driving referrals and winning listings presentations?
Thinking outside the box. We are constantly thinking of ways to differentiate ourselves in our business. We strive to create unique and engaging marketing content. We nailed it with one of our latest projects, creating a lifestyle video of our borough that was shared and viewed thousands of times by the local community. The local attention was attracted organically, and the video went viral with zero promotion.
This project gave us amazing exposure and opportunities to work with local businesses. Don’t look for instant gratification. Invest in your brand and raise the bar — in time you will attract the kind of business you want, effortlessly.
How do you handle working with sellers on pricing?
Honest pricing approach is always our policy. We position ourselves as experts in the industry and know every single detail about property and sale transactions in our local market that took place on and off the multiple listing service (MLS). You can’t dispute facts. Always know your facts.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever heard?
The best advice is not to get discouraged even if something doesn’t work out. As long as you are passionate about your career and care about your clients, this will always see you through. Have the courage and dedication to keep going. Stay focused.
If an agent should stop doing one thing today, what would it be?
Paying for leads. The best qualified leads come from past customer satisfaction. I believe that, ultimately, you want to build a referral-based business. Yes, it takes time, but a recommendation from your past client is more powerful than any paid lead.
Want to connect with Kristina? You can find her on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
You can also contact Kristina at her office address:
1678 Hylan Blvd, Staten Island, NY 10305
