Be hard to beat. Strive to become the best in the world at what you do. There’s no competition at that level. When you focus 100% on what you do, on improving the customer experience, on building a game-winning team, that’s when things change for you.
Discipline and structure
Gilbert Enoka calls it the lethal cocktail: discipline and structure.
Structure - what you do, when you do it and why you do it.
Discipline - committing, then doing it, over and over again.
Here’s the winning structure of the best teams we coach.
Monday - Buyer hit list.
Your database will grow exponentially year on year, flooding with buyer enquiries. Your ability to keep a refined list of the best buyers in the market makes you super powerful.
It lets you anticipate demand. If there’s strong demand for three-bedroom homes worth $1m, then there's a prospect for more of those.
Take a written list of the three most likely buyers to every listing presentation and add a contextual story.
Hannah, who sold last weekend, needs to buy.
Spencer and his wife, who are having a baby, need to buy in the next 60 days.
And Paul, who has to be on the ground for his job relocation in the next 7 weeks.
How would I get Hannah, Spencer and Paul through your place?
Powerful storytelling that gets results.
Let the triggers build your list. If a buyer does any of the below, add them to your buyer hitlist.
Comes back for a second inspection.
Needs to buy by a specific deadline.
Sold last weekend.
Bids at an auction.
Makes an offer.
Buys a copy of a pest and building report.
Review the list every Monday. Use it to guide your prospecting, update your listing presentation, and cross-sell those buyers onto something else.
When you have three bidders on a million-dollar home and one buys, that leaves two buyers or $2 million worth of capital that needs to be placed.
Tuesday - Seller hit list.
100s of appraisals, not a single listing. Why? You can’t progress the customer unless you know their situation.
A weekly discipline of reading over every appraisal you’ve done in the last 12 months keeps sellers at the top of mind.
How many of those sellers are buyers first?
Find them something to buy, and there’s a listing.
Use categories to determine the next action. People who are having a baby, moving jobs, or getting divorced have a higher level of intent to transact.
Know what to do to progress sellers in the less urgent categories. For example, a seller who is discretionary will only move when they ‘see it’. You can work more with them by helping them to discover their vision or dissatisfaction.
“Is there anything missing in your current home that you’d love to see in the next?”
“I’d love some more natural light and an extra living area.”
“What would you pay for something like that?”
“An extra $1m”.
“Yours is worth $3m. If I found you something for $4m, with more natural light and an extra living area, what would you do?”
“I’d sell mine and move straight away”.
“Why’s that?”
“Because I’ve been in my home for 10 years, and I’m ready for something new and that feeling of progress.”
Next time you call the seller, drop that into your dialogue.
“Hi Hannah, it’s Josh Phegan calling. Last time we spoke, you were looking for something new to get that feeling of progress, with more natural light and an extra living area. I’ve listed 24 Smith St. Would you humour me, come and see it, and let me know how close it comes to suiting your requirements?”
Simple and effective. It takes skill, but it moves the unmotivated to motivated and sold.
Wednesday - Listing review.
Not every listing sells super fast. Review all your listings every week. How are they tracking compared to the benchmarks of a great campaign?
Think enquiries, inspections, second inspections, changes to terms, and offers.
If it doesn’t feel right, it’s not right. If you see the vendor's name on your phone and deep down you don’t want to take the call or go to the open, that’s when you know something's wrong.
Short early conversations make light work. Get back face-to-face, build a plan to get things back on track, and use your campaign reset menu to make the choices easy. Then, do great buyer work and get a buyer back to the property in the next 24 hours so the sellers can see small changes and yield buyer momentum.
Daily directions.
All the great restaurants do it. Just before service, they all stand around in a circle and discuss the menu for the day.
You and your team should do the same.
Here’s the meeting agenda:
1. What’s on today? (Review calendar).
2. What’s been listed, sold, or had a price reduction in the last 24 hours, by any agent?
3. What’s our next listing?
4. And our next sale?
5. Anything from yesterday that needs to be done today.
It’s a super meeting. It requires you to be prepared well before the meeting kicks off.
Think deeper.
What’s been listed? Would any of your buyers/sellers or market appraisals want to buy it and then sell it? How does that new listing compare to any of our existing listings, based on pricing, etc.?
What’s been sold? Who bought it? Were they one of our buyers on one of our campaigns? What’s the new SQM rate that's been set? Or what rental yield did the buyer buy it on? Given that sale, do we have any sellers / market appraisals / past clients who should know about that result?
What’s had a price reduction? If it has, is it good value for any of our buyer/sellers or market appraisals? And how does it impact our current campaigns and their asking price?
Use your daily directions meeting to drive workflow in your team. Better calls for better reasons.
3pm Loop-back.
Check in with your head of operations at 3 p.m. every day. This allows you to review the day’s events and course correct for anything that needs to be done before the close of business.
We use Slack. As each team member progresses through their work day, they note every time they complete something of note that I’d need to know about. I pre-read those messages before the 3 pm call to make it a super efficient call.
Own the first 45 minutes of every business day.
Once you’ve completed your daily directions meeting, use the first 45 minutes as a call session to create momentum and opportunities for your future. If it helps, build a list of 10 people to call the day before. That way, when you hit the office, you’ve already got momentum.
There’s real power in visualisation. Spend a few minutes well before you get to work imagining the day in your mind, play by play, and what success looks like for the day.
Great Work List
As the day gets longer and consumer focus starts to be absorbed by end-of-year-itus, shift your momentum by having a great work list. These are simple things you can do if you find pockets of opportunity or strong, principled work to drive your discipline and structure.
Call anyone who bought or sold with you this year.
The feel-good calls.
Past clients who bought.
“Hi Hannah, it’s Josh. Just a quick call to say thanks for allowing me to work with you this year. It was great to see you secure 21 Red St. I hope it’s everything you’ve ever wanted. If ever I can be of assistance, I’d be thrilled to help. Wishing you a great holiday period ahead.”
Past clients who sold.
“Hi Hannah, it’s Josh. Just a quick call to say thanks for allowing me to work with you this year. It was a real privilege and pleasure to sell 21 Blue St for you this year. I hope the move has been highly successful for you. If ever I can be of assistance, I’d be thrilled to help. Wishing you a great holiday period ahead.”
These are super simple calls that remain timeless. When you demonstrate care and attention to detail, the referrals come flooding in.
All past clients.
“Hi Hannah, it’s Josh. The reason for my call is to say congratulations, you’ve owned your home for another year. How are things with you? How’s the house? I thought I’d give you our forecast for 2026.
We expect January and February to be the optimum times to sell. An early Easter, School Holidays, and Anzac Day will make April quite bumpy. There’s renewed confidence with buyers for homes like yours. Let me know your plans. I’d be thrilled if I could help.”
Simple, fast, highly effective. This is a great way to drive demand for your January campaigns.
Every market appraisal you’ve done in the last 12 months.
“Hi Hannah, it’s Josh calling. Just a quick call to say thanks for the opportunity to give you an idea of the value of your home. How have things progressed? What are the next steps for you? If I had a buyer, could I mention your place, or should I sell them something else? The window to sell this year is starting to close. Our forecast for 2026 is that the first quarter will be the opportune time to sell next year. There’s a good feeling about an early February sale. If you’re open to that, I’d love to discuss what we’re doing.”
It's easy to do: make simple relationship calls that change the way you play the game of business.
Strategic review.
As the year closes, it’s a great time to review what’s worked. There are three critical areas to consider:
1. How do you generate your leads?
Review every listing you won this year. How did you meet the seller? And what did you do to bring them to market? How does that compare with how you spent your time and money? Re-allocate to what works. For example, how many of your sellers were following you on social at the time they listed?
2. How you win.
Do the work. For the next five listing agreements you sign, have your marketing team call the seller within 72 hours of them signing the agency agreement. Find out why they made the decision to use you. You’ll receive incredible feedback. Use that feedback to build a simple document - the three reasons 'Why Me?', which can be used in a listing presentation to make it easier for sellers to choose.
3. How you sell.
Review your best campaigns. What worked? Review the ones that didn’t sell. What went wrong? What one thing can you do to tighten up your sales process or standards to ensure a better sell-through rate?
Things that never change in a fast-changing world.
The world moves fast. The one thing that's certain is that the pace of change will continue to speed up. What’s timeless in an ever-changing world?
Relationships. Build them, nurture them, be all about them.
Consistency of effort. It’s the secret sauce. I’ve never seen ordinary effort lead to extraordinary results.
Power of a brand. You build it every day. What does it mean to be your brand? Establish your brand standards. Pull up your socks and stick to the standards that make you one of the greats.
Timeless customer service. It transcends all market conditions. Customer service experience really matters. Define it, then deliver it.
Business is relentless, that’s why we love it. Welcome to the greatest sport in the world. Love what you do, because people can really tell when you do.
