REAL ESTAT E COACHIN G :
Is it Worth it?
Thanks to Chicago Agent Magazine and Justin Porterfield’s article “Real Estate Coaching: Is It Worth It?”.
In many professions, there comes a day when
RISMedia’s recent Outside Coaching Survey
an individual can’t go any further without
revealed that 61 percent of brokers who
outside help. One of the things you ask
responded had employed the services of
yourself is ‘What is my time worth?’ and
an outside coach, and 60 percent stated
what is a non-money-making task, says
that they believe hiring a coach can result
Elizabeth Pyle, an agent with RE/MAX
in a positive return on investment. But is it
Premier Properties. Together with her
always? And what factors, if any, can predict
business partner, Santiago Valdez, and their
a successful agent-coach partnership?
team, Pyle has worked with a real estate coach from Goodfellow Coaching and Consulting for about three years.
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“I’ve been with Ken now for over 10 years. It’s been a great experience for me. When I started out with Ken I was a single agent doing around 40-50 transactions a year. Over the 10-year time period I now have a team of six and we’re number one in our market share and have been over the past 10 years, doing approximately 150 trans a year. Ken really helped me to understand how to build a business and how to get a group of individuals to work together as a team. We want a very systemized team. Everything we do within our team is in systems, and it’s really helped us out overall. So, we give Ken and his team a lot of gratitude for everything we’ve been able to achieve and looking forward to a lasting relationship.” JIM DOLANCH THE JIM DOLANCH TEAM, PITTSBURGH, PA
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POSITIVE OUTCOMES
Before hiring a real estate coach, Pyle’s rapport with her partner and her team were solid. But despite working well together, they felt they needed to find a coach who could help them tighten up some of their business practices. In particular, they wanted help with putting processes in place, building a well-run team, increasing price point and honing their sales and negotiating skills.
Ken Goodfellow, the founder of Goodfellow Coaching and Consulting, has coached for 18 years. He was an established and successful real estate broker in Canada before he moved into coaching. His experience and thoughtful, intellectual approach appeal to Pyle more than the kinesthetic personas projected by many coaches in the industry. “There are a lot of coaches out there that don’t have any experience,” Pyle says. “They’ve either had little experience in real estate or they’ve never worked in real estate. Our goal was to look for someone who was business oriented and had a lot of experience, because they could help us stay focused not just on selling real estate but also on building a business that is run properly and operates well.” Goodfellow believes that the key to developing a successful coaching relationship lies in having clients who are willing to put in the work that is required of them. It’s all about defining their clientele: Goodfellow’s team of nine coaches works only with clients who make more than $600,000, and Goodfellow himself is only involved with those who make more than $4 million. Goodfellow’s firm starts the process with an extensive questionnaire to see where potential clients are with their business. “The agent has to be coachable,” Goodfellow says. He notes that some agents who seek a coach are not actually coachable at all; they don’t want to listen or do the work, so they don’t get results.
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“The thing I always tell people is this: You have to have a clean slate and you have to have an open mind. You have to be able to do the work required, because there is work. You have to be able to focus and be accountable.”
“I’m all fired up again and firing on all 8 cylinders! With Goodfellow Coaching’s guidance, high level concierge service, their depth of knowledge, unparalleled experience, systems and tools, they have me focused on the right things to take my team to the next level. They have given me the confidence to set big goals and we are on the way to a big win this year.” ANDY OSWALD THE ANDY OSWALD TEAM, OTTAWA, ON 4
BARRY COHEN THE BARRY COHEN GROUP, TORONTO, ON #1 RE/MAX TEAM IN CANADA - #3 WORLDWIDE
“I’ve been working with Ken and his team for about seven years. It’s just an awesome experience; it’s much like walking into a specialty section of the supermarket and everything’s there for you. You just take it off the shelf, take it home and make a gourmet real estate experience. Ken’s got us at the business planning. I’m a luxury agent and he’s got a special session for us, so we’re going to more of that and then continue with my weekly, monthly coaching. I want to thank Ken and these fabulous all-stars that he trains, for the wealth of knowledge and the sharing.” 5
EVALUATING A POTENTIAL COACH Industry experience and personality both matter, according to Pyle. She says anyone considering coaching should certainly ask a potential coach about his or her experience in the industry. A personality fit is also vital. For example, Pyle says she and her team spoke with coaches who were more headstrong than their own personalities before finding Goodfellow Coaching.
“It’s like hiring people and having your employees do personality tests,” Pyle says. “When you’re looking for coaching, you want somebody who is going to mesh with your personality.” Goodfellow stresses the importance of finding a coach who can show that he or she knows the industry and can deliver results. “We know what it takes to drive to those next levels,” he says. “There are a lot of people out there who are actually speakers. They’re kind of motivational and they’re really just great entertainers. We [coaches] consider ourselves experts in the field.”
“My coaching sessions with Goodfellow Coaching are one of the most important things I do to improve my business. They understand my strengths and challenges and help me take out marketing efforts to the next level. They never offer cookie-cutter solutions, but truly understand me, my business, and my market.” JAMES WEDGEWORTH CHARTER ONE REAL ESTATE, HILTON HEAD, SC
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IVAN SHER SHAPIRO AND SHER GROUP, LAS VEGAS, NV
“I’m Ivan Sher of Shapiro and Sher Group with Berkshire Hathaway and we have been coaching with Ken Goodfellow for 14 years. Ken has helped us build, maintain and grow our team. My partner and I have an excellent team as it is, but as we grow and do more business, we’re looking for different options and things to consider. Through Ken and Goodfellow Coaching, it’s been phenomenal and we’ve learned so much. I’m always excited to share with my team the things I’ve learned.” 7
FACILITATING FINANCIAL SUCCESS Coaching has paid off for Pyle and her team. In the three years that they have worked with Goodfellow Coaching, they say their income has roughly tripled. The changes came rapidly for them. “In the first four months we started to see
Pyle and Valdez’s annual planning sessions
some drastic changes,” Pyle says. “Stepping
involve going over the previous year’s
into the program, we talked about building
numbers in great detail, reviewing profit
a business and made lots of changes to get
and loss, price point, the number of sales
to that point, as far as setting up accounting
completed and the marketing efforts and
systems, setting up processes, having an
activities that generated the most business.
administrative assistant perform certain tasks
Based on that review, they work with their
and allocating non-moneymaking activities.”
coach to prepare a budget and a marketing
By making those changes, Pyle says, her team
plan, set goals and outline the activities
was able to focus more on their clients and
they need to do each week in order to meet
increasing their numbers.
those goals.
“My business has quadrupled in the 2 years that I have been with Goodfellow Coaching. There is so much information that your business is going to go to the next level even if you only implement 10% of it.” MICHELLE FRASER FRASER GROUP REALTY, AJAX, ON 8
Focusing on the goals they have set for
The strategy of establishing a business plan
their business and following a business
is a vital part of Goodfellow’s coaching
plan established with their coach’s help has
work and is his primary method for
contributed directly to their success. Pyle’s
measuring his clients’ success. Once the
team meets with their coach by phone on
strategy is set, he and his coaches help
a weekly basis, and once or twice per year
their clients meet the goals they have set
at conferences. One of those meetings is a
for themselves. “We look at their goals and
budget planning session where the coming
where they need to be on a weekly basis
year is planned out.
and whether they are there, and whether they are doing the things that it takes to be
“It’s one of the things that has changed our
there,” Goodfellow says.
business,” Pyle says. “We sit down and we set up a budget. We look at what business
“If they’re not at that level, what do we did the year before, where it came from, we have to change to get them there? how we processed it. They [the coach] pick You have to make sure that your clients through your whole business and create a are recording numbers, that they’re new business plan for the next year. Having tracking their business.” a plan and goals set out changes how you act on a daily basis.”
“It is actually not the 70% increase in our volume or more than 70% in our net that we have seen since we started. Coaching with Ken is like having a partner as invested in our business as we are. Ken sees things from a perspective that is unlike anyone else who looks at it. He has an unique ability to read people and assesses situations as though he works in the office with us every day. Ken is ethical and honest and most importantly passionate about this business. He has an incredible instinct for upping our profit. We attend every Goodfellow event and each event is better than the last one. Ken’s coaching constantly exceeds my expectations! His coaches are experienced, knowledgeable and passionate and they all specialize in real estate coaching. I tell everyone that there is nothing more powerful in this business then a Goodfellow Event!”
ROCHELLE DECLUTE DECLUTE REAL ESTATE INC., TORONTO, ON
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“Such an awesome coaching team! Goodfellow Coaching has taken us from merely real estate agents to the consummate business organization and beyond. He knows what we need and guides us there in a gentle but firm manner. What a change in how we go about business! We not only benefit but so do our clients. We are improving our lives as well as our incomes. I highly recommend Goodfellow Coaching!� SUE GOODHART THE GOODHART GROUP, ALEXANDRIA, VA 10
DEVELOPING THE BUSINESS Pyle’s goal when she started working with
years, and recommends agents commit to at
Goodfellow was to “take her business to the
least two years of coaching.
next level.” She has benefitted from the direct coaching in their weekly sessions, as well as
“You might see results in the first couple
from meeting the other agents she says she
months, but really intensive results within the
connected with through her coach.
first two years,” she says. “I see people come in to our coaching program and think they’re
The larger network has helped her business develop in unexpected ways. She can speak with the coach during the weekly coaching sessions, or reach out to other agents from outside the Chicago market for their input. “For instance, we keep increasing our price point to where we’re beginning to slip into a luxury market,” Pyle says. “Part of the marketing that we do and have done, we’ve learned from other agents that are part of this program. It’s really opened our eyes to a lot of options that are out there.” Pyle intends to stick with the coaching program for several
a mess, but that’s what we were [when we started].” Goodfellow emphasizes that coaching is indeed a commitment and that success depends on doing the necessary work to make beneficial changes. “If you think you’re going to come in and we’re going to do everything in one week, it’s not going to happen,” Goodfellow says. “Their [clients’] expectations are set by their time and their commitment and how big their goals are. We’re big on thinking big. Their expectations are managed by really how big they can think and how ambitious they are to implement what we show them and help them with.”
ELIZABETH PYLE CHICAGO, IL
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“Goodfellow Coaching is truly top notch! My team has been coached by Goodfellow Coaching for several years and we have witnessed extreme growth in our sales, team structure and culture. The Goodfellow team is built with highly experienced professionals who focus on helping real estate professionals build structured, replicable businesses. A crucial aspect of being part of Goodfellow Coaching is that it’s clientele is comprised of top industry agents and provides members with opportunities to network and learn from each other. Goodfellow Coaching will take your business to the next level!”
“The takeaway from the Ken Goodfellow event is that he truly is an expert on how to grow and have a profitable team. It’s geared towards team leaders and so far I’ve been taking a lot of great nuggets out that I can implement in my business right away.” MARK FARIS THE FARIS TEAM, BARRIE, ON #1 ROYAL LEPAGE TEAM WORLDWIDE
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NORTH AMERICA’S #1 EXPERTS IN TEAM COACHING By invitation, application, or referral only.
Email: info@GoodfellowCoaching.com | Phone: 1 + 866.248.0008 Office Locations: Toronto | Ottawa | Fort Lauderdale