Inman

How to use successive approximations to get more referrals

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Do you want the people who make up your center of influence, or COI, to think of and refer you when someone they know wants to buy or sell real estate? Of course you do! Are you doing all you can to encourage this to happen on a regular basis? Let’s see if a bit of psychology dating back over a century can help.

Edward Thorndike’s “Law of Effect” around the turn of the 20th century led to B.F. Skinner’s work with operant conditioning and successive approximations. Who cares? We do and here’s why:

Thorndike said (this is oversimplified, of course) that behaviors rewarded tend to be repeated.

It makes sense. Skinner said that if we create a chronological series of steps toward desired behavior that we can purposely reinforce behavior in a systematic way — increasing the likelihood that a predicted outcome is met.

So, we want to create a road map for what we want from our center of influence. Let’s keep it simple; try this:

1. We want our 200 targeted center of influence folks to respond consistently to our social media posts. Why? Our posts build our brand with our COI and the content is not accidental.

So? Reinforce this by strategically responding to every written post. People love being noticed and appreciated. Don’t over-respond. Desire for attention is trumped by need for sincerity.

2. We want our 200 targeted center of influence folks to consistently engage us as the resource for all things real estate.

How to reinforce?  

3. Ultimately we want our 200 targeted center of influence folks to refer us to friends and family who wish to buy and sell.

How to reinforce?

The key to applying successive approximations in real estate is to see these three steps, responses, resources and referrals as being consecutive or chronologically ordered. Each step consistently met increases the likelihood that the next step will be realized.

Brian McKenna manages two residential resale offices for Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices, Blake. You can follow him on Twitter and onFacebook.

Email Brian McKenna.