Guerilla Training Blog by Matt Jones

The Ultimate Website — It’s Better than Ever!

The numbers are in for last month and they are better than even we expected! Of course many of you know that our company has long been an innovator in the field of online lead generation for the real estate professionals and was featured by CNN’s Pulse on America program almost a decade ago as, “changing the way real estate is done in America”. Still we’ve continued to perfect the science of online marketing and help agents generate their own business and not be dependent on national aggregators like Zillow, ... Read More »

Quick Answer Series: What About Ads in Home Magazines?

I think advertising in home magazines can be a good investment, or it can be a total waste of money. If done properly, home magazine ads can be a very affordable source of new business while making your listing clients happy at the same time. Done incorrectly, it can put you in the poor house with next to nothing to show for the expense. When I had about 60 active listings, I personally experimented and tested various ads in several magazines. At one point, I was running 8 full pages ... Read More »

REALTOR® Websites Reach an All Time Low!

According to the National Association of REALTORS® 2007 Member Profile, a full 60% of all 1.3 million REALTORS® have websites — nearly twice as many as just five years ago. Read the report overview. As I read that statistic, I was truly glad to see our industry moving in the right direction… And then I read another statistic from the same report: “The typical REALTOR® received four inquiries from their Web site accounting for about 3% of their business.” When I read that I was stunned. Truly stunned. With over ... Read More »

Is “The Tank” the Next Active Rain?

I am seldom surprised. This one truly surprised me. When we launched our brand new agent think tank and discussion forum, The Tank, just a few days ago we thought a few agents would join. But what happened, we were not even remotely prepared for. In just a few days over 200 separate topics by hundreds of members! In a word — AMAZING! And the posts are very thoughtful and well articulated. Not a single negative post to date and I must confess, I am very surprised. Many are starting ... Read More »

My Independence Day

As we approach July 4th, I can’t help but think about my own personal “Independence Day”. My Independence Day was September 1, 2002, and if you’ll indulge me I’d like to take a moment to share it with you. I hope that you’ll find it inspirational. I came into real estate like many of you, as a second career. Being new to the business, I followed the advice of many experts whose books I’d read or whose training I took either in person or by recording. Now, I should mention ... Read More »

Learning from Failure: Lesson Four.

As I’m sure you know, it is difficult to operate a business in today’s economic climate. It is more difficult to operate a start-up business, particularly a restaurant. That’s why I bought a going concern. During the course of my due diligence, I was given P&Ls for the previous six years of operation, all certified by a CPA. The most recent six months’ financials, however, were not available. I did, however, have numbers from the previous owner that showed consistent sales for those last two quarters, as well the owner’s ... Read More »

Little Ditty About Tom and Marian…

I was working at my desk last night around seven when my phone rang. It showed to be a Missouri number and I thought it might be an agent needing help so I answered. I met the wife of a husband and wife real estate team. Marian. Tom and Marian work for a local franchise real estate company. I didn’t ask for their permission to share their names so I have omitted their last name. Marian was very youthful and energetic sounding so I was floored when she told me ... Read More »

Making a Great Referral!

Here is a secret that will make you lots of money. In fact, is one of the best I’ve ever seen. If you have a lender you work with on a regular basis, the technique I’m about to show you can work even better when doing cross-referrals. Try it out and let me know what you think. I believe you’ll find it to be one of the coolest ideas you’ve ever heard when it comes to doing referral business. I first discovered this technique quite by accident. I began as ... Read More »

Ten Steps to Real Estate Success (Introduction)

One of the most rewarding things I get to do is to teach agents, and yet one of the most frustrating things I do is to teach agents! What’s up with that?! Here’s what’s up with that: Some agents “get it”, and some agents don’t. The ones who don’t remain set in their ways no matter how much training they get, and they typically fail or merely subsist on a meager income for most of their career. I think the agents that fail, or at least fail to truly succeed, ... Read More »

Wow! Was that Timely or What?

Talk about perfect timing! On May 26th I posted an article discussing our need to add value or die (click to read article) — the very next day the National Association of REALTORS® settled their three year old anti-trust lawsuit with the Department of Justice, ending what many believed to be the most important challenge our industry has ever faced. What does that have to do with adding value? Everything! After cutting through all the spin, the simple explanation is this: our National Association released a brand new VOW policy ... Read More »