On this episode of the Real Estate: Real Success podcast, Chiyoko Kakino has an in-depth conversation with Ron O'Neil, the Director of Training and Development for CENTURY 21 B.J. Roth Realty Ltd. Brokerage in Barrie, ON, about how to create a successful onboarding and mentorship program to help new and experienced agents achieve their goals and grow their business. Interested in opening your own brokerage?
Interested in opening your own brokerage? Learn more here
On this episode of the Real Estate: Real Success podcast, Chiyoko Kakino has an in-depth conversation with Ron O'Neil, the Director of Training and Development for CENTURY 21 B.J. Roth Realty Ltd. Brokerage in Barrie, ON, about how to create a successful onboarding and mentorship program to help new and experienced agents achieve their goals and grow their business. Interested in opening your own brokerage?
Interested in opening your own brokerage? Learn more here
Welcome to the Real Estate. Real success podcast, where we talk about key business, successes, and Lessons Learned along the way in the hopes of inspiring brokerage owners, and managers to find new ways to grow their business. I'm your host choke Aquino. And in this episode, we're going to take a deep dive into onboarding agents to a brokerage. So I'm super excited to be joined by Ron O'Neal. He is a director of training and development for Century 21. BJ Roth in Barrie, Ontario, Ron. Thank you so much. For being with us today. Nice to see you. Well, thank you so much. Gioco, and it's an incredible honor to join you as well. It's I've just been watching a podcast over the last number of months and just seeing the speakers that I have been lined up. It's such an honor to be here and representing our brokerage and talking about the our onboarding program. Well, it's honored to have you, Ron. I feel the same. So, can you give us, can we start off by talking a little bit, about your background and your journey to getting into real estate? Because we started around the same. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we actually stayed start the same year, same month and I've seen your journey and you've been watching my journey with the brokerage and stuff. I do have to tell you it was how we started. Was definitely an unconventional way because usually trainers director of training and development usually comes from a real estate background, in fact, I didn't come from the real estate background. I came from the corporate world. So how it all came about, was I just knew Bernie Roth, broker Notre with Century 20 Jay Roth and he's been a huge supporter of Easter Seals and the year Before leading up to getting my position with him. I used to go out support Easter Seals with Century 21 and one of the, some of the questions I would always ask. I was always taught by parents when you have a successful entrepreneur ask sometimes the questions about their own success and one of the things that the question always came back to yours, one of the conversations we always talked about was was what is the biggest challenge that you're faced with in your brokerage? And he said, training and development? And he says, you know, that's, that's known into this industry and then eventually Over a beer and a few conversations. He invited me to join The Brokerage and I'll tell you what, a learning curve. It has been because facilitating and training and in the corporate world and facilitating training in the real estate world is completely different and we're going to talk about that in the next hour. Great. Well, again, thank you so much. You know, it's interesting because as you say, We join the same year, the same month, but the other thing is I didn't come from a real estate background either. I came from the corporate world. So we share a lot. Yes. So, you know, you talked a little bit. We introduced you as a director of training development and you just talked about that role. Can you explain a little bit about your role at BJ Roth? Because not, every brokerage has a person like you. So tell us what you do? Yeah. So basically what I, my whole goal every single day is I facilitate, you know, pretty much 100% of the time and Mentor the other hundred percent plus, most of the time, the other part of the program that I do is I do the law the recruitment because we have a very unique recruiting program because we Going to talk about this. We actually recruit agents before they even become agents. And so there's a lot of different capacities to my role. But the first its recruiting, that's the big thing obviously recruiting as the primary at the second is, basically onboarding the agent to The Brokerage and then eventually getting them into the various training programs that we also have in The Brokerage as well. Because I'm just not the only trainer we have Tamara who's going to be joining us a little bit later as well. She's going to talk about the are other extended training programs and how this all flows. In together into one complete package. Well, you doing some amazing things and we're going to talk about all of those things in today's episode. So I just want to stay a little bit about getting to know you a little bit better. You know, I looked at your LinkedIn profile. And as you said, you come from the corporate world, you have 15 plus years experience in training with a wide range of Industries. So what do you think some of the key elements are that make up a good training program? Yeah, the that's the big thing. And I was thinking about this the other day because I know I have a some training programs going on this week with some of our agents and goes back to a couple years ago before the pandemic. And remember I was doing in this training session a couple years ago around st. Patrick's Day. I know I'll never forget this. I had this talk to, I talked to the agents about getting out door knocking and dropping flyers. And then a couple hours later. I'm driving downtown and passing by the Saint Paddy's Irish Pub bar. Guess what? There's three of my agents drinking, right? I'm thinking, how do I get them from that from that Pub to that to the door knocking? And that's been some of the biggest challenges that we've been faced because in the corporate world, it's about accountability. You can walk into a sales training room and saying, look, we have to increase our sales by eight percent this year and or we're going to be put on probation in this industry. Yeah, we could do that. But guess what, they could also walked it onto another brokerage. So the whole key goal is, how do we engage? How do we motivate? And how do we make them accountable? And that's kind of the key. Things that we've been working on with this onboarding program, because the important thing is, when the Agents come into this industry, they feel so lost. Right? And a lot of times they might know, one or two people and the industry, but usually, those people are running at too fast too quick. Yes, they can have a coffee with them. But how do we as agents or trainers within the brokerage engage them? And that's through really important. And we're going to talk about using zoom using your energy, engaging them and then building out accountability. Oops, of getting agents to work with amongst with other agents, in The Brokerage, to be accountable, to get out door, knock and, or do those cold calling, or whatever it needs to be for lead generation. And again, I think the big thing is, is basically instilling motivation and accountability to the program and getting systems in place. And that's, that's the biggest challenge, because agents can just ignore you and just go down to the pub and have a beer. There's a lot of beer flowing in Barry. That's easy. That's how you met bird appear in Barry. There is. So let's talk a little bit about The Brokerage now, so can you give us a little bit of background on since you to and BJ Roth? And some of the, and some of the markets that in which your brokerage operates in? Yeah, when I first started out its, it was very intimidating when I first started out because it would, we were five offices at the time to about 130 agents back seven years ago, and now we're up to ten offices. Has. And I think we're probably geographically, one of the largest offices in Canada, as Tamara would say, she's probably ordering up the corporate jet to go for between the offices. Now, that's how big it is. Now. We service small communities, you know, five to seven hundred people in a community, all the way up to 140 and up to into the millions into the GTA. So we have a very diverse set of offices which also becomes very diverse with the amount of Agents. You know, we do have corporate Style. Into the more relaxed style, rural agents and stuff. And it's important for both as a recruiter as well as a trainer to also understand how important it is that not each agents is the same and not each market is the same and how you know wearing a suit and tie doesn't work. Hell up in the Muskoka is when you're sitting on like the scope when you're out having a drink on like Muskoka, right? So your clients are different. So again, it's diversification and I think you know even with We can attest this. There's challenges though. I wish I can say that every day is a is simple and it's easy to work with all the agents. But when you're when you have a big brokerage, it's a lot to manage in a lot to to navigate because how the deals are done, being done in Toronto can be completely different done up in the north. So again diversity, diversity is key and knowing how to Pivot with each of the markets that were in. So, all right, you know, as we Talked about you, we both are celebrating our seventh year coming up in April next month. So I've seen a lot of changes over the seven years that I've been with Century 21. What have been, some of the biggest changes you've seen in the industry since you joined. Yeah, and actually there was a great question because when I looked at the awards was so we had our awards ceremony about three to four weeks ago. And when I was looking at the winners that were coming across the award winners, there was coming across, I saw a lot of new faces up there and one of the key things is over the past year. I've been interviewing a lot of the new agents that have really kind of spiraled all the way up to Centurion Award winner and I've been asking what are you doing? What like what have you been doing differently and and I've been asking about their commission about how they do their the process and their lead generation and majority of them have done completely the opposite of what most agents would think they're doing, is they're actually upping their service. They're upping their the way there. Acting with their clients. And when he mean by that, I remember seven years ago when I joined, I was talking to an agent and the law the number of agents and they said, oh loyalty is dead, you know, because the technology is pushing us further and further away from the client and it has it has been we know that, right? But the reality of what these newer agents are doing it and it's been amazing to watch them there. They've turned into full service agents. So what I mean by that, when they go in and get a listing agreement signed before the even, the ink is dry on the paper. There was walk in with 100 boxes from their local moving company with their brand with Century 21 branding on there and it's already there at the front door. The next day. The governor has been shows up the next day after that, the Deep cleaners show up and then the stagers and it's amazing and iodide has some like, what, how much are you spending? Like? That's a lot of money, but we have to take it into context that the money that's being made 24 months ago compared to today. They're making double the amount. And I was talking to our G Hill, one of our Centurion Award winners. And I asked her how she changed her in the street and she said by becoming a full-service agent within for the, her clients instead of her spending, say fifteen to twenty thousand dollars in lead generation, like electronically generation, what she's done is she's literally taking that money and put it towards the experience with her client and then the clients become their Advocates, become their Billboards out there. And she says, I don't even have to, like my My goal was to get to your five day. One of your five and to get eighty to ninety percent of my business. She's in year, 4 already at nine percent of our business is referral from her from her clients. So again, I think that's the big change and I think another thing that shocked a lot of the agents, the more experienced agents when I was at the award ceremony. I was asking. I said that well, how much how much are you getting for your commission? Two and a half three percent, you know, on on the sell side and I like 3% in our Market, especially this close to Toronto was unheard of right, but I Again, and the thing is that by providing that full service experience when salsa is there not even a negotiating commission? Yes, they do sometimes but majority now, we're pretty lucky. We're outside of Toronto. It's pretty tough to be in the Toronto Market. I can imagine in Vancouver Market or Montreal or the bigger cities, but our Market because these agents are doing such a phenomenal job. They're getting the commission that they want now, well, that's I think that's fantastic because it's really what they're really doing is creating. Wow moments along the way, right? So the end of the day, their, you know, their client is have an exceptional experience. And I think you've talked about this before, many times, is they've created raving fans and then those raving fans become ambassadors for them right there. There, the advertising billboard ads you say so that's, that's really interesting to know what I love that you asked agents. Like, you know, how have you been successful? Like, how did you get from here to there? Right? Because you're learning, you're probably taking some of those best practices. Susan really incorporating them into the programs that you have at your brokerage. Oh, hundred cents. And I've seen the success of it, especially over the last two to three months. Because, you know, I've gone back to some of the agents that I've trained out over the years and I said, how would you reinvest into this service experience for the for your clients? And I can already hear the success and the, you know, what's really nice? I can see, you know, the last little while I've seen people agents walking in with flowers. I'm like, oh, who are those flowers for the old for my clients, you know, and they're picking up baked goods. They know what they say. Taken their coffee, you know, it's those little details, right? That it's that's making the difference in even though the pandemic has really pushed us further. And further away these experiences in these, what these agents are doing, is absolutely amazing and reinforcing that loyalty is still alive and real, right? And it's just that we have to give back and we have to work even harder. Now today than ever before to maintain the relationship and build your business. Well, I think the pandemic really, even though it's pushed as far away. It just makes Us have to be more creative and how we create those. Wow moments. Right? So, you just really need to think like, how can I replicate this experience, maybe, you know, in a socially distance environment or virtual environment. But how do I replicate an in-person experience in the virtual world? And I think people Mountain really creative and I think that's one of the great things that people who, you know, kind of take it as a challenge and look at ways to overcome that challenge. Yes. How do you, how do you, how would you say? That you differentiate your brokerage from other brokerages in your markets, what to do. It's communication. If you take a look at, you know, I've worked in the corporate world, talked about communication over the last, you know, 20 plus years. And if you take a little look, the root cause of a lot of issues out there with within any business, with any industry and that's communication. And I think it's this is going to be the death of me. But I have a guy, have a rule and Tamara both Toronto, have a rule that we have to reach back to our agents if they phone call or text. This, we have to respond at least with a text message, within five minutes acknowledging that they've Texas or acknowledge the they called us. In fact, I've been on this call for about 15 minutes and I've already got three phone calls and I managed to respond back already to them about deals and that's that's the key thing is that we're going to talk about the what the mentorship program. But knowing having agents know that they can reach out to me and and know that I'll get back to them within a few minutes makes a huge difference. Difference. Now don't get me wrong. I don't I don't expect every manager or every trainer to do what I do, but the thing is that, that has been a success that has been a selling feature to our brokerage as an example. A total just over an hour ago. I received a text message from a guy who's in a gym. His name is Julian. He texted me and he says, Hey Ron, it's Julianne was just talking to your agent here at the gym. I was just wondering if you have a few minutes to talk about my future career in real estate. I called him back. And I said, Hey Giuliana, and all I could hear was laughing in the background and so is this Jewel? And he goes? Yeah, this is Julian. We're just laughing because I'm sitting with here with your agent. And your agent said, don't worry. He's going to call you in five less than five minutes and
sure enough. You know, I have a meeting with him tomorrow morning at 10:00. And again, that makes a big difference knowing that on a Saturday evening in mid-july, and a beautiful Saturday after Saturday evening knowing that they can call somebody. And then they can get somebody to give them guidance and direction. That makes a Difference once that when someone gets back to me and I'm sure that you feel the same way, but if someone gets back to you, I'll talk more so you can actually answer your agents and that's right. Yeah, really all have to talk more in this podcast. So the, you know, when someone gets back to you quickly and seems like they have a sense of urgency that makes you feel really valued as a person, right? And I think that the that that feeling of being valued in the feeling of being respected is so important, so it's nice to hear that we're going to talk about your mentorship. And training programs, and some of the amazing things you're doing to recruit new agents to your brokerage, but I did want to start off by talking about onboarding agents to your brokerage, because that's what the theme of today is taken the Deep dive into onboarding. So can you start off by telling us a little bit about your onboarding program? Just give us a little bit of an overview. Yeah. So the onboarding program is quite in-depth. It is if you were to count how many key things that we have to go over it probably equates up to about 500 different areas that we have to go over which is quite interesting. Hence, but the thing is, it's broken down in different categories. So as an example, we start out with the c21 tools and the c21 family. I talk about you choke. Oh, I talk actually use you as a recruiting tool about our recruit our recruit for a brokerage as well as then we go into this the, the board tools. Then we go into this obviously lead generation. And then we talked about the follow-up after lead, generation. And then we talked about offer in hand, offer handling and then it's just it's a very Just basically going through a transactional process. It's almost like that but making sure that I think one of the key things that we forget is we tend to jump when we talk about lead generation, or when we talk about onboarding, we tend to move right into lead generation or offer handling. And a lot of times, the agents, don't know, all these little details of, you know, getting photos done, getting buying a domain name setting up your website. So it's really important that it's all individually, broken down and the thing is Is that at the end of the day, making sure that you have an onboarding checklist and we saw one through Tamara had showed it to me when you guys were at Chairman's Circle the other week. I think it was Joe, live set a great onboarding checklist. And I think it was brilliant because what happens is a lot of brokerages will have it administrative onboarding checklist, but you have to have an agent onboarding checklist, that reflects that admin checklist as well and making sure that we're following through on that on the list. Because if you don't have a check list and you're not revising it every year and I've been guilty of it as well, where I've gone, two years without revising, it and there's new technologies in place. So you do have to be accountable to the onboarding. And you have to review it every year. And one of the other key things is that when you're reviewing and doing an overview of your onboarding every year, bring it to experienced agents as well as new agents. Let them give you the 360 on it as well because again, they're did change their demands change, right? So you have to Lament The that onto the onboarding program as well. You know what I like about you Ron? And I'm sure your whole team's the same is that you're always like checking in with the agents. You're always asking them what they need your always, you know, asking them for feedback and I think that's what fine-tunes. Everything that you've done it, your brokerage and why your brokerage is just, you know, amazing. And so if I was an agent that went through your onboarding program, what would I get out of it? Like what, what, what are the goals of the program? Well, first of all, you're going to, you're going to be building your sphere quicker faster easier, right? That's the big thing. The other thing is you're going to, you're going to be converting faster as well. That's the whole thing is to show them how the process works in building. The your sphere up and converting the leads and and having systems in place. That's probably the biggest thing that the agents will benefit from. But the other thing is is that they are going to be taught from A to Z within the onboarding program. They're going to be because what I do is I go through like Technology process of doing an agreement of purchase of sale. And what happens what I find is that I tell them, I go look gioco at the end of the day, you're going to be doing a deal in about 2 months from now. And you're going to, you're going to get, you're going to be stressed, you're gonna be nervous. But at the end of the day, don't worry, I'm going to be right behind you. I'm going to be supporting you going through the transactional process just because I teach it today. I don't expect you to know it three months from now. So it's just what we're going to do is where it's just like riding a bike. We're going to get back on the bike three months from now. Now and we're going to go through that transactional process with you and you're not going to be left in the dark. And that's the big thing is, is that just knowing that we're going to review everything. And then when real life happens, we're still with you through the mentorship program, but we're going to we've already touched on it on the onboarding program. When you talked about some of the topics that you cover in your onboarding program already kind of putting them in different categories as you go through that. So, how long, like, how many categories do you have? And how long does this onboarding process take? Yeah, it usually so it depends on the age and because if I have a full-time agent and he does say he or she does for deals in the first three months. Right right away. They're going to they're probably going to probably stop the onboarding program within four to five months. Now if it's a typical agent that's going through the onboarding program. It's usually six to eight months. And again, it's really depend on what experience they've got. How many conversions they've done and And how and also, how independent they are. Because I do find that there are certain qualities of Agents. They walk in, they have all the entrepreneurial skill sets and behavioural sets already in place and all the you have to do is show them the tools, so sometimes it might just take two to three months, but it's usually three to eight months is the average for the agents in the program. Now, it now, for time wise people ask me like how many hours do you commit a week to these agents? I usually commit two hours a week to the agent. Now, they're based upon their schedule. A lot of times. I do training on Sunday as well. All I do training in the evenings. Now. The other thing is that I usually I always do my training sessions in one hour segments, and the reason being is because if it goes longer than an hour, it gets challenging for the agents to digest everything. And if it's if it's like especially when you're going through deals and stuff. It's a lot to take in in one hour and I always tell agents when you first or when I talk to other mentors and other onboarding trainers out there. I always tell agent start out really slow at them because They can get quite intimidated as well. And also, and this comes into our recruiting part of our process as well. Always remember that new agents. There's always, there's always a level of fear that the educator has provided. So, each provincial educator puts a little bit of fear into these students. And what you have to do is you have to address those concerns because a lot of Agents, Their Fear is getting sued right and losing their license or suspended or something. So also really address. That earlier on in the onboarding process, that the reason why we have the onboarding and the mentorship program is to protect you. At the end of the day, in anything you do is going to be done through us. So not to worry that you're going to be left in the dark on a Saturday evening. That's great. So, you know this onboarding program, I think that you said anywhere from, you know, you know five to eight months. It's the program different for new agents coming into the industry, versus agents that I've been in the industry for some time. I'm yeah, definitely. What you have to do is again going back to the checklist. What I do is when an experienced agent, comes through the door, I do an audit with them because I got to figure what, what do they need from us? Right? First of all, what happens a lot of times when an experienced agent is coming across from to us. There's a reason why and you have to find that pain point of what motivated them to come over here and you have to work with them. A lot of times. We recruited three experience. Sorry, new agents that were already with another broker. In the past week or so. And the reason why they came over was because the other brokerage over under delivered and over-promised on their onboarding and then Through the Grapevine Grapevine of our agents, that talk about our mentoring and are more program which allowed us to recruit those three agents and again it. Yeah, you do have to do an audit on each agent that goes through the door. If it's a new agent, like just brand new radio that the box type thing. I have to start right from the beginning and go Through if it's an experienced agent. I just audit them and find out what they need from us. But they the key thing for me is to get them onto the c21 tools right away, right? Because again, those are powerful tools and I you know, I have so much accolades with this new program that we have out there. It's just makes sense. It is, it is seamless. It is amazing and that if I can get them on the CRM and if I can get them on the digital marketing Center and the email system and get that all working for them, that's better buy in as well. Well, as your as you say, it's, you know, if you can get them in the technology, some of the platforms that we have are so powerful, and they're automated. So if you spend 50 minutes just to set it up, then you can spend time on the rest of your onboarding program, right? So it seems like that's a really good plan. How do you measure the success of your onboarding program? Yeah. That was a tough. That's a tough question because it's hard to make, you know, everything's anything is quantifiable right for the most part and it the whole thing is you have to kind of take a look at it because I have agents that walk through the door that their wife makes a million dollars a year, you know, he comes walking in and he spends eight hours a day playing on solitary and but his wife thinks he's at work, right? But then there's the other agents that walk through the door that bag of the park and they're very extremely successful. Now, I always always look at the program as a case-by-case basis because each agent is completely different. I always look at it. And this is how Bernie and I look at it if we have 10 Just through the program. And if we didn't have sorry, if we didn't have a proper onboarding program, usually Ada, the ten agents don't make it within five years or we're seven, right? And so now our success with our onboarding and training program. Now, we're seeing that six out of the ten agents are staying with us longer than five years. So I think that's probably the biggest quantifiable number that we can take a look at. And again, taking a look at the Agents of join us two to three years ago. Are they getting to the awards level, you know and are they? Plateauing and things like that. So but I think it's the retention and the numbers at the end of the day. Well, you know, it's I think that's a great way to measure it. And the last time I was in Barry actually in you know, the award ceremony was just like days before, you know, the world got shut down and we you know, you have a team down and Alex and you know, 15 months having their licenses and their Centurion winner already. Like it's just amazing to see some of the quick successes coming from your brokerage. Yeah. I just want to just want to make a note at that. I cannot take the credit for didn't Alex. Those guys like spectacular. I've never seen two agents. Do 120 deals in their first year. That's just that's just unheard of. There's they're spectacular. Yeah, they are. Have you changed your onboarding program over the years, you know, have you done as you say, you're always looking for feedback? You're always tweaking. It, you're always reviewing and on an annual basis. What are some of the major changes that you've made over the years? Well, I think that the biggest changes is that especially ever since the start of the pandemic, obviously technology became the driver and the front seat for us with transactions and lead generation. And that's one of the things where we had to change it up with the onboarding program. Take a look at, you know, because we were in lockdown, how do we continue to build our business? So, we had to Pivot with that making those changes. And then, as we were coming out of that first wave of the pandemic and all of a sudden, basically, the housing market became like the commodity Market of, like, buying nickel today. It's like the market just Just like that in the instant. And what was happening is that all of a sudden there was, there was 10 offers for every house over asking and no conditions. And so what happened was a lot of the training and support in the onboarding and part of that was training out technology in teaching them out how to do an up and offer in less than an hour. And now we're pivoting this this past two to three weeks were changing our onboarding program. Because now I'm, I'm getting phone calls. Ron, I have an offer. I think I have to negotiate now. So now I'm we're going back into negotiating and Tamera who has our Mentor, more Mentor Monday, Porygon program, every 10 a.m. Every Monday at 10 a.m., You know, we have to. We also address the those big issues to The Brokerage as well. Not just to the new agents. But again, I think as Market shifts as technology enters into our space, we're continually pivoting and changing with the times. And you, you have to be very careful because with the onboarding program Find it, that it can go very still, very quick and get out of unattainable, reach to the agent-based. Now. I think I learned a really good lesson. The last probably, the last over the past seven years is when when I first started out. I thought the Silver Bullet for lead generation was social media. That was the big thing. So we put a lot of money towards that. And then, you know, about four years ago. There was a lot of noise in the E3, the electronic lead generation area and then we kind of fizzled off and we shouldn't have done that. And then because we didn't spend a lot of time on the onboarding program, talking about social media, and we end up losing to agents and those two agents became and Tick-Tock icon. Within the real estate space, and that was a, that was a major drop in the, but that was a major issue with our Brokers. So we are now revisiting, and bringing back those social media, even though we did talk about social media. We talk about building out your Facebook page using it as a as, you know, using ads manager with Instagram and Facebook and such. But the thing is that with technology changes, we can't just rely on the door, knock in the cold calling and think that agents are going to do that, we have to Look at the new generation gen Z, that's coming up. That's killing it in the look in the social media space, right? And I think again, it's we have to change with each year. Well, and I love that theme and I love that you're always kind of looking at, you know, kind of where your opportunities are. What challenges you faced, you know, someone's left your brokerage, you know, why of they've left? And how can you change things to accommodate all the new things that are coming out and they're coming out so quickly. So you've given so many great tips to The listeners. But if, you know, let's summarize them. So if someone wanted to either start their own onboarding program or revise, their current one, what are some of the top tips you give them? Oh, number one. It has to be talked to your agents. Talked to the agents that are experienced talk to the agents that are about a year in the industry, get their feedback and what their experience has been like. And the other thing is that you have to look at reach out to other brokerages. This is one of the things, whether one of the things I just love about Century 21. Is I called This u21 family, we've had great support with a lot of our brokerages across Canada. I know that Teresa has been a huge supporter of bringing the family together over the years, and, and the ideas that have come from the other brokerages on how they do the onboarding, how they do the training and stuff like that. So you have to look outside and you have to have those mind share moments with other brokerages. So I think if there was two top tips, get feedback and get look outside your brokerage to other brokerages and how they do their onboarding program. Well, I love the tip that I love that you gave. As we went through, this discussion, is always review it on annual basis, right? Because, you know, you can look at something. You're like, oh my gosh, that's three years old. It seems. So out of date. And then, you know, it's, you know, so always making sure that it's relevant to today's agent. Right? So we talked about onboarding agents by training them to leverage the technology, the tools or resources, the systems, everything that they need in order to be successful and productive in their career, but We all know it takes more than just, you know, training them on technology, right, in the steps. They need to go through. They need to be mentored coached and supported to really be effective. So let's talk about your philosophy on the importance of a good mentorship program. I've talked to many brokerage owners in the last few months and it seems like the buzzword these days is mentorship. So why do you think a mentorship is so important in helping agents be successful? Well, I think what it is, is, if you come down to it, the If they, if you have a strong mentorship program, then the agents know that you got their back and that's the key thing is that mentoring is designed to support all hours of the day. Support them in their in their most stressed stressful moments. And that's the important thing. And you know, one of the key things I was speaking of alcohol. Again. One of our agents was dropping off a bottle of whiskey the other day to me and it was interesting. I was talking to Her and and she said, you know, one of the key things I would, I really like about this mentoring program. As you kept me, calm through the whole process. Now, this, this eat this particular agent. She was a high security person for the government. She was in the government, and she says, your calmness when I would call up and I, you know, I my my nerves would be on edge, you would just calmly take me through it, but you had my back, every single minute and this agent did call me probably. I think last week in the weekend before probably 20+ x, right? And that the thing is that, you know, you have to have a huge dedication towards the mentorship program and we've struggled with it. We, you know, I remember talking to Stephen Chow and Paul Baran and all the top Brokers across Canada about the mentorship program because we've had our ups and downs with, with trying to get it built out. But the thing is that we have changed it up and it's been extremely successful, but you have to have dedicated people. To it that our undying to the customer service of the agents and I can't stress that anymore. Because if you take a look at my social media page, you'll see a few photos of me, Backcountry camping with my laptop, you know, on a picnic table, doing it, help doing a deal. And that's the mentorship program. You have to unfortunately have to take some of some time of your personal life to help them out and the good thing about that. It, it, it relates back to, they just go back to the gym, talk to Agents, they go back to their training course with in real estate and Lee talk about us. And that's another feature that we like about it because they know that were there for them, every step of the way. Well and they're really becoming ringing fans some of your brokerage. Right? And it's a, you know, recruiting tactic, right? Is that it is hard to talk and say that, you know, Ron, you know, has my back, you know, I made 20 calls to him in the last five days and he's always return them within five minutes, whatever it is, and I think that's really, that's really special. I know that our last So we're speaking to one of our Vancouver brokerages on his mentorship program, but your program is set up a little differently than his is. Can you tell me how your mentorship program is structured? So we we've had challenges with getting agents to the mentorship program because we've seen you'll get agents into the mentorship program and then they get too busy or life changes or whatever the situation might be. So we decided about two years ago and that the mentorship program would be from The management as well as the trainer's. So the basically and I know this is a really huge undertaking for a lot of managers and trainers out there and owners, but we felt that if we took on the mentorship role on top of our existing roles that that provided seven days of support. And we knew that we would be where we were accountable, because that was our role 14 hours a day of supporting our agents, and that's been a huge success. And the Agents have really, really enjoyed it now. Now, I do have to warn you, if you have, if you have say, two managers or two trainers doing the mentor program and Tamara can attest to this, what agents tend to do is you always have to when you're building out the mentor program. You always have to tell the agent if you're reaching out to me, you have to reach out to Tamara as well because what agents tend to do and reach out to us at the same time because what they'll do is they'll go from mentor to mentor to trainer to train or till they get the answer. They want to hear, make sure. Your mentorship team is all in the same page of what's being said. So there's no confusion out there because you can, you can lose credibility with one Mentor over another when when says something different to the other. So you have to be careful with that because I've been in this industry enough and I especially to Americans say the sort of the last two, three weeks. I can I can trace the agent, calling One Mentor, then the other mentor, and then the other mentor and then the agents all confused. And so, you have to be careful with that. Right. So the the mentors are the management team and the management trainers right exam and that. And I think, you know, when we talked about how you differentiate your brokerage versus all the other brokerages in your areas. You talked a little bit about communication. So, how important is communication in this mentorship program. Like, I think it's pretty key. Probably for you. You got that five minute rule. So it must be key. Yeah. The whole thing is that you have to instill confidence in their agent, to make sure that they don't worry about calling.
On Friday night at 6:00. It's okay, you know, I don't have a life, you know something some days but like I just as long as they know I think they have the confidence. They know that there were going to be there for them and they don't have to worry about you know, don't I would say don't be so Canadian when he called me and say sorry. Every time he called me just because you called me, 20 times, this weekend. It's my job and I enjoy it and I love it. And you have to look for certain traits in mentors as well. They have to be passionate about what they do and they have to be like if you You if you ever met Tamara Tamara has the biggest heart, right? She's she's very caring and you can see that. That's why she's a manager. That's why she's a trainer. That's why she facilitates in many different ways within the real estate space. And that's what makes a great mentor and and she's willing to drop everything, you know within reason to help the agent out and we are going to bring to Mehran and just a couple minutes and I did have a chance to meet with her when I was in Palm Springs for our chairman Circle event. So she is lovely. You know, did you what are some of the changes that you've made? Like, how long have you been running the mentorship programs? It's about, just over two years. And what what's really changed? It's basically our movement going from an agent-based mentorship program to management based mentorship program. The nothing really has changed. Its just being there for them. And obviously, Zoom technology has made a huge difference for us because we're able to assist them and putting deals together virtually. Now. Now, whereas where a lot of times what they would have to do is they would have to come into the office. Now, we don't have to do that. We just say, you know, I'll share just I'll make you the host to share your screen and will assist you in a little will take you through that. The other thing I was going to say is that because of the pandemic and because of us using Zoom, my, the amount of training sessions that I do for. The onboarding has has almost increased by about 30 to 40 percent because when I was doing the regular training sessions face-to-face, It wasn't unusual out of every ten meetings. I was getting three or four cancellations, because of weather because of the kids because of this. And that. Now, out of every 10, I might get one cancellation. So I think Zoom technology is really made a huge difference for us and, and, as well as the engagement with the agents, like, I've, I probably have recruited probably the last 50 agents. I've recruited. I probably only met them. Personally, maybe 10 of them, and they're all still here with us. He's right. So. Well, they're going to be very excited when they actually meet you in person. I don't know. You're great on Zoom, but you're even better in person. I will thank you, know about that. But thank you. So what are some tips? You give the listeners out there if they wanted to start their own mentorship program or they want to make revisions to it? Some key takeaways. Yeah, key takeaways definitely reach out to the other Brokers reach out to me, especially I've I do have a macro level onboarding program that I've built out. And the other thing is that you should join up with other brokerages in your area within the Century 21 family and build out onboarding program, and it does take a lot of work, but I'd be more than happy to host. Our give guidance on it on the program. And I think again, it is a very daunting task and it took me years to build it out. And I always say, you know, when I first started in the industry, there's a lot of lot of people holding onto their knowledge. And now today with this newer generation that's coming through the doors. I'm Ending that let's let's just share, you know, and I think that that's the key is is that if a brokerage takes this on individually it can be. It can take years to do so you might as well work with other brokerages that have it. And then you know, and find out what they're doing with their onboarding program on Rod. You said it too, is like the power. One of the great things about Century 21 is the network right is, is all the four hundred offices out there that you can collaborate with and, and you can, you can support each other. So, that, that Is one of the biggest powers of the Century? 21 brand here in Canada. What else are you doing to train and support your agents on an ongoing basis. The big thing is that this is going to go over to Tamara. So, the whole thing that we've started up with Tamara is her Mentor Mondays, and I'm going to let her talk about that as well as we're really promoting out Century, 21 University with ever since we've had Tamara join us. I was kind of focused really high. Deep down into the onboarding and recruiting and then ever since tomorrow's, come on board. She's provided that extra layer of training and support. And tomorrow. I'm going to hand it over to you and you can talk about some of the things that you've done and it really improved our brokerage with training. Sure. Yeah. Thank you, choke. I'm going to jump right in. Really, I'm fine everyone. I just want to make sure that everybody knows that is the general manager of central 21. BJ, Ross, again. I have it. I had a great pleasure of meeting her just a couple weeks ago. I don't even know if it's been that long but I absolutely love what lovely and she's passionate about what she does. So tell us what you're doing to train and support your agents on an ongoing basis. Sure. So I think that, you know, II came on board about anyway, it was summer of last year and just kind of connecting people together and doings. We do a mentor Monday. And what's really interesting about that is that it's not always me, you know, a lot of times if there's nobody that's that's willing to host it. I will just pick something that I'm hearing lots of. Questions about and then do a presentation on it and have a great discussion as a group. But what happens often? And when you talk about mentorship because we mentor on the front end when they come in and then eventually they end up breaking off and developing their own friendships and we have also certain agents that have a lot to offer and that also are very giving. So we really have created a culture around here that you know, and there's not everybody is on board, but most people are on board that they become better. When they help other people, learn. So, we often have these these agents within our brokerage that will take a topic on Monday. We just had an agent soon night. She did a presentation about how to help a buyer buying Cottages in Muskoka. And it's just, it's just a lot of information shared that, that not everybody knows. And also, it makes them feel more involved in The Brokerage and with the success all together, so it creates quite the team. We're also doing the Fini trading. We're quite The buffini Brokerage here. We love everything, but Feeny. So we do 100 days to Greatness. And there's always a course going. And we have more facilitators than just myself and, and Ron. There's also other agents that want to, it's their idea. They're like, okay, that's great. I'd love to become a facilitator and Mentor from the Fini as well and they they will do that eventually as well. And it's just trying to reach all the levels to. So and what's interesting is we have another agent. I'm just going to keep saying Named Jason Carpenter and he's joined the hundred days to Greatness as well and he's been in the business for forever longer than me. So I'm just it always amazes me that the really successful agents are always willing to take those. What would be termed as kind of newbie courses? Right? And you've been in the business real estate, 11 years, I think right? 11 years. Yes. Yeah. Well congratulations. Thank you. So I'm going to Pivot now because we are getting close to 50 minutes before the hour. I didn't want to talk about recruiting because your brokerage is doing some amazing things with regards to unit, recruiting new agents and attracting agents to your brokerage. So, I don't know who wants to talk whether to Mayor Ron. What are you doing to recruit new agents to your business? Yeah, actually, that's the fun part of my job. I love recruiting and the reason being is because I get excited and that one of the things is that if you ever listen to me on a recruiting call, it's like the like the And on the other side is like wow, like I like because they can barely get me off the phone because I'm so excited to talk about a brokerage and how great it is, right? That's the big thing but I'll talk about first of all, how do we get them? How do we get that lead coming in radio advertising? Without a doubt, is our biggest one right now and you have to be careful with radio ads because again, the thing is that you have to Target the demographics that are getting into the industry. So we're going for right now. We've been running During the pandemic, we were looking for a second career people. So we're targeting those radio stations that were had those listeners as well as we had, we were targeting the younger generation and that's been incredibly successful. The other thing is that not all brokerages can do this and this is probably being our biggest success. We actually pre-trained almost 80 to 90% of our agents. So what I mean by that is that we put out on radio broadcasts. A, are you in? Are you currently in real estate training program. Call now? Cabron, I'll even personalize. The phone calls call Ron at you know, this phone number to find out how you can get free training from The Brokerage. And so what they do is they call up. They said my brother said to call you guys about some free training program. I'm in the educational program at Humber, which is our education program here in Ontario. They said come and learn about it. I said, yeah, sure. Definitely, we set up a meeting and just like this gentleman that contact me over an hour ago, how that meeting is going to go as its goes like this. So they Come into the meeting. And we go through all the value added of why you should be joining The Brokerage through the training, the onboarding, the mentoring, etc. Etc. And then what I do is right at the very end, I never asked them to join a brokerage. What I do is I do an assumptive close. And all I do is I'll say Julian, you said you work weekends? Okay. So would you, would you have the availability of this Friday? Just coming in doing a training session because I could promise you to the ends of this Earth? How greater brokerages and Great, the training program is but at the end of the day, you got to see the training program. So what I do is I get them to come into the do the training program, the one-hour training session, after I do the recruiting call. And then what I do is I want to mending the next training when that first training call. All I do is okay. What day do you have next week? And they never, I never have to ask all they do is they, it's called an assumptive close, right? And then eventually, one of our radio, DJs Rito DJ personalities, here, in town. She goes wrong. I just got a recruiting call from another brokerage. But I guess I'm joining your brokerage missing. I guess you are. She goes. I've been training him for three months and you've never once asked me to join your brokerage. I said, I know. Now the the key thing is that because we pre-trained our agents A lot of them. So they're in Facebook or Instagram, social media groups with other real estate agents there in the training sessions and they actually recruit for us. So it's a win-win situation and That's probably been. Our biggest success is pre-training, but that's a commitment and a lot of brokerages out there would say, whoa, Ron, really? That's do you get them to sign a contract? I said, nope, unless that's all others, right? Unless they come through and they, they want to financial commitment from us in some form or fashion because sometimes the agents want the program to be paid and then we put them on a they say on your first commission check then we'll help you. Give us the money back. That's been a huge program as well. But again, it's a financial commitment by brokerages and a lot of owners don't want to do that. But it's been, we take the risk and it's been a win-win situation for years now, but, you know, even if you don't have the money to advertise on radio because depending on what Market you on, but the price does vary, if you're in a small Market forces, you know, the GTA, but I do like that that I'm going to call it a CTA, right? That call to action, as you know, you know, when are you available? Let me just spend an hour with you training you and then, you know, you can really kind of see. Our brokerage has to offer and what how I support agents, you know in their success. So when you're talking those are new agents, how does that scripting change if you're talking to an experienced agent? Let's just say an agent. Well, I don't know, four years or 10 years or whatever. Yeah. It's it's a completely different to conversation because reason being is because why are you calling me? Right? That's the big thing, you know, and what you're doing is you're looking for the pain point because there's some, there's some type of motivation why they want to move over to your to this tour. Brokerage, one of the big things that I'm finding right now is because we're coming out of the pandemic. And unfortunately, a lot of agents are not coming back into the brokerage. So what I'm fighting in from the experienced agents is over the last, probably six months is that I'm looking for culture within a brokerage. I'm looking for something where I can go and I can meet up with other agents. Now obviously with smaller offices. That's more difficult with bigger offices that you have the advantage of more traffic through the office itself, but I think what it is, is that I've been trying to recruit on their pain points finding out, you know, why are they leaving the other brokerage? And I get again a lot to things that I keep on seeing is I want the culture. I just feel like a number in this brokerage. It's too big or the. Number two thing is is that I just the my my broker trades and real estate and you know, he's not getting back to me or she's not getting back to me. And that's the other thing is that I want to know that I can call somebody with a legal question on a Saturday evening, get somebody and get an answer. So I don't have to worry. Until Monday morning. Wow, that's great. You talked, a little bit about, you know, pivoting and some of the things you've had to change because of the pandemic. How has that affected? How you recruit, and train, your agents. It's actually, it's actually improved actually one before the pandemic. I was doing on average, four to six, training sessions a day. And again, I had a higher cancellation rate because they had to physically come into the office. So now I can plug in 6, to 8 meeting training sessions a day and I can get people trained faster quicker, easier through Zoom technology. And then on top of all this, I'm actually recruiting further and further out. So I don't have to recruit an agent that that's within 20 minutes of might drive. Right now. I'm recruiting agents an hour, two hours, three hours away from me. I have agents over in Ottowa, right? Because they've moved out there and they knew that they were going to get the support and they're still with us. Us. And so I've agents literally from Like three, four, five hours away, right? And it's been working out. So it's really improved. The pandemic is actually improved the way we do and provide service and our clients. So it's actually been a benefit. Both the amount of training sessions we do and the range at which we can do training yet. So you've been training your training person prior to the pandemic. Now your training on zoom, zoom super effective, as you say that, it's that connection no matter where you are in this world. What are the some of the things that you've learned? Earned as you change from doing in-person training and recruiting to on Zoom. What are some of the things you've learned that you have to do? Yeah, you have to make sure you still wear your suit here and still wear the jeans stand up. So, the whole thing is it, what I do find is, is that as you're doing, the the zoom calls in the training, you have to, have that energy level, right? So, as you can see, I use my hands a lot, right? And you have to use, you have to always remember, Make sure you have your coffee or tea, the first thing in the morning, but what I like to do personally when I'm training and Tamara can attest this because she walks by my office, probably about three or four times a day. She goes. All Ron does is stands up and walks around the office all day long. Because what I, what I've told some of the other trainers, don't always put yourself on camera because if you're on camera, you're sitting down all day, what happens is get yourself a headset with Bluetooth and then just stand up and Walk and Walk and Walk. Keep your energy level up because that's going to To transfer over into the conversation with the with your agent, right? That's probably the biggest thing is get up and walk around and and keep your energy level. The other thing I was going to mention was I eat? I like I love stories, right? If you if there was one thing and Tamara as a professional facilitator using stories to engage your audience, especially today because there's enough in our wheelhouse that you can use for training and keep them engaged because I find we story stick theories, don't write. Always use your stories and when you're training on the zoom and even in general, I love that story. Stick theories. Don't, that's, that's a that's a really good takeaway, you know, it's interesting wrong because, as you say, you know, you have to, you know, have your coffee and tea walk around, you know, everybody finds different ways that they can generate energy, right? To make sure that they showcase that on Zoom. One of the things that I do before I go on to a training session or you know, a meeting to talk about this in 221 brand, is I listen to music like I listen to something like really
Lee. Even if it's 7:00 in the morning, I'm going to listen to some dance music and that just gets me happy. It gets me energized. And then I just, I'm in the right mindset to give it all, I got. Yeah, you know, it's funny you mention that because there's always a head set up in my that's on my head all the time. And I have two headsets. I have my music headset and I have my, my zoom headset. And that's what when I'll take my zoom heads at off and I'll put my music headset on because that does provide that does provide me with a lot of energy as well. So great. So, two more questions before we wrap up? What? What are some tips that you would give a brokerage if they wanted to take their business to the next level? Definitely, you know, taking a look at how our brokerage has changed over the last number of years. We went through, we went to from am a very heavy management based company to more training and mentorship based program. We're putting him way more money towards training and mentoring because where's the money at it's training and support, right? That's the big thing. And that's worked out really really, really well. Well, and that's why having Tamara and we also have a technology trainer that's in the brokerage. That's really helped us out. And remember, if you can diversify, if you have the budget to diversify the trainers, because you can't as Tamara know is, you know, she's taken on this new role and she goes, you know, she looks back at it going. I don't know how you guys did it because there were so few of us a couple of years ago and then luckily, you know, we've been able to diversify the training with Our people because technology training is in a job in itself, a lot of dates. Right? And the thing is that, you can't be everything. That's the important thing as a trainer as a mentor, right? And the last question for you, Ron. What is the biggest challenge you've ever faced in your life, whether it's, you know, being in the real estate industry or in your career at all, are in life in general, that ended up being a blessing in disguise facing Fierce, you know, that's that's always the biggest thing if you ask me. Five years ago, would you if you were going to a funeral? Would you rather be doing the eulogy or would you rather be in the casket? I had 25 years ago. I said I would rather be in the casket right during like now 25 years later. You can't shut me up. You put me on a zoom call and in front of the group and I'm not afraid. But the thing is that that's if you ever take a look at my my city email signature just below it. I have a saying your success is on the other side of fear, and and I think that that's very important especially in there. State space. Because when when we talk about lead generation, why do a lot of Agents fail is because it's not, it's not always accountability, but it's the fear of facing their fears, right, you know, and I always tell agents, they said, you know, your fear today is going to be your comfort zone tomorrow. So let's go towards it. You know, when I saw that at the bottom of your signature, just a couple weeks ago, and I'm like, I got to remember to ask him about that. So I'm so glad that he says, that's great. So Ron, how can people get a hold of you, if they want to reach out and ask you a little bit more about, You know, your onboarding program mentorship program recruiting whatever yet. Certainly you can reach out to me that via email. Obviously Rhonda Tony Lo ntil at c21 CA you can also reach out. Check. You can always go on my profile in call me my phone number. I'm always open but the key thing is that I love to work with other brokerages across Canada, as you know, Teresa and I and Bernie and and Tamara the whole team. Here. We really embrace our seat. When family and strongly believe in it, and I think, you know, I've been part of a lot of Corporations, but I've never been part of a family. So I agree. I agree that the, in the seven years, the the culture and the uniqueness of Century 21, runs so deep for me too. So I completely agree. So Ron thank you so much. Wonderful seeing you. Thank you so much for your energy and your knowledge and your passion to the brand Tamara. Thank you so much. It was nice to see you again. Even though this is for its really, really Appreciate your time. Well, thank you for having us. Appreciate it. Bye. So you are listening either. You're listening to this podcast live or listening to the recording on Apple podcast Spotify or Google podcast, or you went to the Century 21 franchise a.ca website. Century 21 is one of the world's largest residential real estate companies in the world, with presence in 86 countries. And here in Canada. We are 11,000 plus strong and we are looking to align ourselves with individuals who share the same vision to what the future, bro. Courage is look like. So if you're interested in growth opportunities, please feel free to reach out to me or my colleague, Gary's Aleppo. You can find our contact information on the Century, 21 franchise dot c, a website or of course. You can connect with me on Facebook or LinkedIn. Thank you so much for joining us today.