Leigh Thomas Brown, a real-estate agent with 25 years of experience, says the single question "Do I have your permission to tell you the truth?" fixes client relationships by shifting from adversarial to collaborative. Asking for explicit consent to be honest lets you present data-backed options and realistic scenarios instead of hiding assumptions about what clients need.
So let's just say you're in sales and you've hit a moment where you feel like your clients are the enemy. That happens when there is a disconnect in communication, which results from a disconnect in understanding what the desired outcome actually is. How do you get this fixed though? Well, let's go back to the beginning. Where did you start the client-person relationship? Did you start it with an assumption that you were going to be selected? Did you start it with an assumption of what they need? Did you start it with assumptions about the economy or the marketplace? You probably did, 'cause that's how normal humans behave. And the longer you've been in your professional field, the more likely you are to make a whole bunch of assumptions. I know that after 25 years in real estate, I make a lot of assumptions because I know everything, except that I don't. If we want to fix the really tricky client relationships, we have to understand that at the end of every sales opportunity is getting somebody else what they want. I think it's the one thing that's been missing in real estate for all these years is a fundamental focus on getting the client what they want. And sometimes what they want is to not move. It is to stay put. It is to not buy the house over here that backs up to a 4-lane road or a proposed 4-lane road. And sometimes it has to do with telling them the offer they got is terrible, or that the offer they want to put forth is terrible. It all goes back to honesty. And honesty sometimes means that somebody else getting what they want means you don't get what you want. And if you want your clients to trust you, they have to know that you do put their needs first. Now, how do you get there? Well, in that first client consultation, in real estate, we talk about how it's going to work. We talk about the process. We talk about our state laws with agency and all of the hard and tricky things, and sometimes we forget to ask a really important question. So if you're in sales, I want you to ask this question at the beginning of every single client interaction, or the customer interaction that you hope, hope, hope will turn into a client interaction. You ready? Get your reading glasses, get your ink pen. Do I have your permission to tell you the truth? Very simple question. It all goes back to permission-based marketing, what Seth Godin has talked about for years. If you haven't read his books, highly recommend it. And it's something my dad taught me when I first got into real estate. And actually, he told me this when I was working in sales for Husqvarna. Ask the other side, do I have your permission to tell you the truth? You also have to shut up after you ask that question. That's a different skill for a different day. But I want you to remember that when they give you permission, because they will, And by the way, if anybody says, "No, you don't have permission to tell me the truth," you should walk away, wash your hands right then, because that's never going to work out if you don't have permission to tell the truth. So now, once they've said, "Yes, you can tell me the truth," what I'm going to be able to do later is say, "Your house is wonderful, and we have an opportunity to improve it if we pull the wallpaper and paint it." We have an opportunity to present this in a better way if we do X, Y, and Z. With that buyer, you can say, yes, I'm glad you like this house. And if we make an offer of X, Y, or Z, I can defend that with market data. And if we make an offer that's lower than that, it's harder for me to defend it. However, there are possible outcomes. When you start talking to people about the possible outcomes of if this, then that, just like they do in coding world, or Plan A versus Plan B, or the classic Ben Franklin pros versus cons list, you'll find you have a different relationship and it won't be so contentious. You'll also have this super duper advantage later on. Let's say that you asked them, "Do I have your permission to tell the truth?" And they said yes, and then there was nothing contentious, everybody was all peas and carrots, and then you hit a point 3 months later where you're in perhaps in real estate, you represent the seller, the buyer has brought in a really unrealistic list of demands of repairs, and your seller bows up, because that's what people do. Just like that little surprise kitten on the internet, they bow up and say, "I'm not doing it. It's a used house. They can take it or leave it." Your job then becomes the person that says, "Do I have your permission to tell you the truth?" "Argh!" "Well, you told me 3 months ago that I did. May I tell you the truth now?" You're going to ask it again. You're going to reiterate. That you want to be truthful in this. You are not being combative, but you're being truthful. And they'll say, yes. And then you can say, look, we have a couple of options. If we say no, they can walk away, then we go back to square one. Here's what that looks like in possibilities. If they— you say yes, then the buyer can be happy and we can move on. And here's the total cost. And then you can present the outcomes. I have found that Our ability to get people to pull back and look at possible outcomes has everything to do with the initial approach. So, if you want to have better client relationships, go back to square one. For the record, if you have a client relationship right now that's gotten combative, you can still take it back to square one. Have a meeting with them and say, "Do I have your permission to tell you the truth?" Tell them what's happening in the market. Maybe the market doesn't look like you expected. Maybe the buyer's reaction wasn't what you expected. When they say you can tell them the truth, you can say those very things. The economy's not what we expected. The market is different and the buyer is behaving differently. It will change your relationships and it'll change all of your outcomes. Bonus alert, you won't have as much of an ulcer in dealing with difficult clients. For more things that you'd like answered, leave me a little note below, hit the bell, and I'll see you next time.
