Thanks for checking out "The Outbound Engine"! You've come to the right place for insights on outbound business development in the property management space. Every week I'll be sharing strategies, tips, stories, and tools to help entrepreneurs and sales professionals level up their game. I'm excited you're here, let's get into it.

Someone forward you this link?If you're not subscribed already you can do that here.

The Lead - The Almighty Process

A lot of sales people roll their eyes at the concept of process. It can feel rigid, or like a surrender of control. On the other hand, there are some leaders who live and die by the process to a fault. Success isn't truly success unless it followed the almighty process.

It's an interesting conversation in the world of property management, because "process" is critical in general and rightly a hot topic of conversation. And having a process for business development is a good thing.

One thing I've noticed particularly in this industry though, is that sometimes operators can "over engineer" a sales process. It's well intended, but I think there's a better way.

Qualifying prospects really means two things - qualifying the property but also the owner of that property. Being clear on criteria for both is essential. In my opinion, there's a lot you want to uncover to avoid bad fits or misaligned expectations down the road.

But there's a risk in methodically vetting the opportunities that come our way. Put simply, the word is friction. If we place too many obstacles in the way of our prospect, it's not hard to see why we could perceived as difficult to work with.

I'll share a specific example from a client. Their salesperson is newer to the industry and organization. He's doing discovery calls with prospects, and has a good guide for questions to ask as well as some key things we're looking to uncover.

Based on his lack of experience, we're not at a point where he has final say over whether or not a prospect and property will be a good fit. That will come with time and a little more experience in the trenches.

Because of that, we need to get a more experienced property manager involved in the process. This is a good protection for the business, and reduces the risk of bringing on the wrong clients that will ultimately cause headaches later.

So here's the challenge - how do we bring on the right owners, while also not creating friction that will turn people away?

There's no one size fits all solution here. To get to the right outcome though, we need to think not only from a perspective of what works best for us but also what works best for the prospect. We also need to be intentional about the way we articulate that.

Here's one way it could play out - salesperson has initial screening conversation. They ask discovery questions to uncover the prospect's goals, intentions, overall mindset around management of their property. Assuming they're qualified, we go to the next step.

At that point we can bring in a property manager to join the salesperson to visit the property and meet the owner (if possible). We want to see the condition, is it as rent ready as they said? This can help establish a deeper level of trust, because now the owner has met someone from operations who they will likely work closely with going forward (not the salesperson).

On it's face, I would say this is a good way to do the level of qualifying we desire without slowing things down too much. In many cases, getting to see the property before assuming management will start the relationship well. It's another opportunity to set expectations, particularly around rent-readiness and leasing timelines.

But what happens when the property manager is too busy? The salesperson is frustrated because they need this person involved, and they aren't available. Are we scheduling these weeks out? May not be an issue in some cases, but absolutely opens the door to missing out on deals.

You could make the case that a prospect who isn't willing to engage in the process we've built, they likely wouldn't be a good client in the long run. I think their could be some truth in that, but it's not entirely fair.

I really want to boil this down to two things:

1. Create a simple process that has the least amount of friction possible, but still properly qualifies the prospect.

2. Be able to articulate why it is this way.

Point one may seem self explanatory but it's harder to execute. It's important that you not just think about your need to qualify, but also the aspect of reducing friction. If your sales process is so focused on you, then you're missing the point.

On the second point, it's ok to have steps in the process that may be necessary. If you were truly willing to take on anything and everything, then you could put an Amazon-esque check out option on your website and never talk to a prospect! I've yet to see it done but maybe it's coming?

The key is you have to be able to articulate clearly not only what the next step is, but why it matters. Assuming you can reasonably justify that, then you will continue to build trust with people who are mostly reasonable. If you can't, it feels like you're just adding red tape.

It is a good, and right thing for organizations to properly assess whether a prospect is a fit. The danger though, is we can create a process that is very focused on ourselves and not our end user. We will miss out on opportunities as a result.

Finding the balance may require some trial and error, that's ok. But remember to listen to the customer. What they're saying (and not saying) could reveal some surprises.