Does Your Technology Help You Recruit and Retain Agents?

I am planning my trip to New York City to attend the Inman News conference January 9-11^th. I understand that the Inman conferences are focused on and dedicated to the advancing technologies of our industry and they do an amazing job however, there is always one vitally important component missing at these events...the topic of recruiting. I would love to see more break-out sessions on this topic. Last Inman, there wasn't even one. In my world, recruiting, retention and training of agents is the key to survival and profitability in any market. It is especially critical in a correcting market. Without agents you have no one to blog, no listings to syndicate and no clients to experience your fancy map search.

Recruiting has always been one of the most challenging aspects of the Brokers survival and, based on what I have seen in our industry, it is also the most misunderstood and misguided practice. There is a great deal of responsibility placed on any consultant who claims they can help a broker recruit. This makes it hard for brokers to find brave souls who will share their skill set to assist brokers in this process. That is why there is very little information available compared to the mass quantities of training materials and seminars for agents.

I find it interesting that brokers successfully train their agents to "recruit" buyers and sellers and yet still struggle with their own recruiting attempts. I feel this is due, in part, to a lack of understanding of what agents are really looking for. My friend Jon Cheplak of The Real Estate Recruiters is an innovator who understands what is most important to agents. It isn't money or compensation plans. Jon says:

"The agents have spoken and they are speaking with their dollars. They are spending their dollars on Coaches. The critical focus for the broker is to be the best Coach in the market, not the best manager and to be able to successfully transfer their skill set to all their agents. Agents don't join or leave a company, they join or leave the leader."