These NAR statistics blow my mind every single time we talk about them. 

According to the National Association of Realtors®, 85% of consumers say they are likely to work with their agent again. 

Yet only 12% actually do.

These people already know you, like you, trust you, and decided to do a real estate transaction with you. 

Yet because agents don’t want to stay in touch, they miss out on repeat business. You’ve already done the heavy lifting; you’ve proven yourself. You’re a legitimate commodity in the business world and the real estate industry. But to keep your clients, you must follow up and stay in touch.

This is not going to be about gifting or giving these extravagant things or having these amazing client events, (which all work at varying levels). I believe in starting with the conversations that build an actual relationship. So I’m laying out three ways to stay in communication and create 32 touchpoints with every client throughout the year. 

1. Relationship-building calls

If you’re calling your clients “past clients”, you’ve already forgotten about them.

These are your clients. Think about an attorney with clients or a doctor with patients—these professionals only call people their past patients if they decide to go elsewhere. 

So to scale your business and maintain a relationship with your client base once they’ve transacted, you need to call them at least three times a year. I’ll tell you exactly when to call them so you don’t sound too ‘salesy’ or have that commission breath coming out of your mouth.

Call them on their birthday. Who calls you on your birthday? Maybe your mother, perhaps your kids. That’s about it. Call people on their birthday. And when you call them, the script will be the same every time. Use the F.O.R.D. (Family, Occupation, Recreation, Dreams) script.

Ask about their family. Ask about their occupation. How’s the work environment? How are your wife and kids? How’s your uncle? 

And ask about recreation. Do you have any summer vacation plans? What are you doing for the holidays? How’s the past year been for you? 

D stands for Dreams. Ford is an acronym. I never get the dreams. That’s too weird. No one wants to talk about that with their real estate agent. So go for R, skip the D, and call them on their birthday.

Call them on the anniversary of when they transacted on their property. That’s number two. Use the same F.O.R.D. script again. 

Call them anytime after Halloween up until the first week in January. And the script is straightforward: “Nick. Hey, it’s Tom Toole here. I hope you and Michelle have a beautiful holiday season. I just wanted to see how you and your family are doing. How’s the work environment been? What plans do you have? Are you staying local? Are you traveling? Hey, I just wanted to let you know I’m super grateful for being able to help you with your home purchase. If you ever need anything real estate related or if you know someone who does, I’d love to talk to them.” 

That’s step one—pick up the phone and call your clients. Yes, shocking. I know. 

2. Send out a monthly ‘How’s the market?’ update

We do a ton of videos here. You only need to get into that weekly video cadence if it’s something you want to do. And we’ve been doing it since 2016, where one video goes out weekly to the database every Tuesday, and we’ve never missed one. 

If that’s too much for you, put together a monthly ‘How’s the market?’ video. It’s simple. It’s easy. You talk about how many homes have sold, how it’s changed year-over-year, what has happened with prices, and what it all means for the consumers in your market.  

It’s simple. You already are having these conversations with people daily, so record it and send that out once a month. So now they’re getting 12 emails from you with value-based content. Not, “Hey, I’d love to help you sell a home, or I’d love to help your family member.” 

It’s value-based content on top of your three relationship-building calls a year. So that’s already 15 touches in a year. 

3. Direct Mail

I’d be putting all of these folks on a mailing list. And you want to think your quarterly mailing plan is this. You can do this as much as once a month or every three weeks. We implement it every three weeks.

If you send them out every three weeks and every quarter has three months, that will be four pieces of mail a quarter (plus an overlap at some point during the calendar year), which brings you to 17 pieces of direct mail every year. 

Plan out your direct mail for each quarter in advance:

  • Google map with homes sold
  • Market statistics
  • Local events (this has a lifespan much higher than the other two because it gets hung on their refrigerator). 

All you need to do to mix into the last direct mail piece is a client review or a social proof piece. You may even have a client event that you can share.

32 Touchpoints Per Year

That’s all you need to do to maintain a relationship with your clients:

  • Call them three times
  • Email them 12 times
  • Mail them 17 times 

You are now talking to your clients and reaching out to them 32 times a year. 

That’s how to stay in touch and ensure all your clients actually work with you again.