Highlights from Sell-a-bration® 2017

By Lisa Tomcko

Each year, Sell-a-bration^® grows, and this year’s big show in Phoenix welcomed a near-record number of attendees: Nearly 1,000 people packed the Arizona Grand Resort & Spa Feb. 9–10 for the industry’s premier education and networking event. This year’s theme, All About REAL Business, brought the focus squarely on tactics, strategies and takeaways that helped attendees foster and grow their businesses. Here are the highlights from Sell-a-bration^® 2017.

Keynote Speakers

This year’s Sell-a-bration® was keynoted by Jon Meacham, presidential historian, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and contributing editor at TIME, and Brad Inman, founder and publisher of Inman News. Meacham kicked off the first day of the event with an address touching on the art of leadership. He focused on a few important qualities:

• Leaders are masters of culture. “You have to be where your people are so you’re part of their ambient reality.
• Leaders have courage and know the difference between when they’re being courageous in the face of adversity and when they’re being bullheaded and heading toward disaster.
• Leaders must be humble enough to have the ability to admit a mistake, and to ask for help when they do make mistakes.
• Leaders foster a sense of empathy and put the interests of many over the interests of themselves.

While Meacham looked backwards at the lessons gleaned from history’s great leaders, Inman looked forward at the world CRSs will soon occupy.

Inman discussed the importance of transaction compression and seller certainty. To illustrate the concept, he talked about ordering a razor his barber used while in the chair, and having it arrive at his home hours later courtesy of Amazon. Years ago, that hours-long process would have taken weeks.

He also told attendees they don’t need to worry so much about the impact of technology on real estate, and instead embrace what their humanity brings to the transaction. Have technology take away the duties that are irrelevant to you so you can focus on offering your most valuable asset, your humanness, to clients, Inman said.

Keynote Chats

At the CRS Talks keynote, Tim Hur, CRS, drew a distinction between diversity and inclusion. He likened diversity to inviting everyone you can think of to a party, but then people confine themselves to groups with others like them. “You can silo people into different tables, and that’s not really the point of diversity,” Hur said.

By contrast, he compared inclusion to everyone at that party going out on the dance floor and dancing together.

Hur concluded his talk by having audience members unlock their phone and pass it to the person on their right. “How did that make you feel?” he asked the crowd. “Uneasy? Exposed?”

He compared this exercise to the transfer of trust and responsibility in a real estate relationship. “There’s a lot of trust involved in real estate, and there’s a lot of trust involved in diversity and inclusion as well,” Hur said. “A lot of different cultures won’t give you that trust very easily.”

In the closing keynote hosted by CRS President Leigh Brown, “How Does a CRS Do That?,” a panel of CRS experts composed of Jen Burkamper, CRS, Karen King, CRS, Gary Rogers, CRS, Brian Teyssier, CRS, and Juan Ramón, CRS Spain, took turns answering attendee questions.

The first question posed to the group was this: What one thing from your business can everyone implement to generate a significant return on investment?

Karen King said she knew she wouldn’t be doing much business after an EF3 tornado destroyed 272 properties in her town in 2011. So, she turned her attention to helping organize volunteers through a local church.

“Everyone’s willing to help, they just don’t know how. They want to be asked,” King told the audience. “So my motto was: ‘Consider yourself asked.’” Her quick action led people to view her as a community leader, which has increased her business now that her town has recovered.

Gary Rogers talked about his most successful client event to date—renting out a movie theater for the Rogue One: A Star Wars Story premiere. Rogers explained how he funds his client events.

“I’ve always taken $100 from every single transaction and put it in a different checking account, because it’s so tough to dig into your pocket when the market is slow,” he said. “And that’s when you should be spending the money.”

The Star Wars event went viral, particularly a picture of Rogers’s 6-foot-5-inch son dressed as Darth Vader touching light sabers with a pint-sized counterpart who was also costumed as the villain. Rogers said he garnered 11 transactions from that boy’s family alone.

When asked for one piece of advice to give attendees, Jen Burkamper responded with a simple but crucial pearl. “My mantra is: ‘Something is better than nothing, so don’t paralyze yourself. Just go ahead and do it.’”

Education Tracks and Sessions

This year’s event included nearly 30 educational sessions held in four concurrent tracks: Systems, Operations & Leadership, Marketing, and Performance & Development.

Systems track: Gee Dunsten, CRS, introduced a system of content marketing to become a celebrity in your market. Larry Kleinheksel, CRS, offered a 25-step system to success in real estate, and Connie Erickson, CRS, shared her system for winning the listing interview every time. Debbie Yost, CRS, hosted Systems 101. Orly Steinberg, CRS, talked about establishing work-life balance, and Kimberly Cameron shared her systems for building referrals.

Operations & Leadership track: Linda Craft, CRS, shared strategies to build a multimillion-dollar team, while Mike Parker, CRS, and his operations manager talked about running a long-lasting team, and Monica Neubauer, CRS, offered tips to start a team. Duane Duggan, CRS, talked about building a legacy, while Joe Bell offered tips for a smooth succession transition. Derek Seal, CRS, offered specific steps to becoming more charismatic.

Marketing track: Alice Heiman taught agents how to generate leads on social media. Christel Silver, CRS, went over the nuts and bolts of international real estate. Kevin Tengan taught agents how to build cinematic videos. Chandra Hall, CRS, led a panel of experts discussing the secrets of their marketing success. Karen Mistrot, CRS, offered a deep look at effective farming strategies, and Mike Selvaggio, CRS, wrapped up the biggest marketing lessons from the entire event.

Performance & Development track: Kendra Cooke provided attendees with a template to block schedule their days. Debbie Yost, CRS, led a panel of experts on shifting to becoming the CEO of your business. Nabil Captan and Mike Duncan, CRS, offered advice CRSs could use to help clients with their credit. Raejean Christopher discussed the value a showing agent could bring to a team. Tim Burrell explored the art of real estate negotiating, and Rich Sands, CRS, taught attendees the pillars of Peak Performance.

 

Missed this year’s Sell-a-bration^®? Well, there’s always next year. Make plans now to attend Sell-a-bration^® 2018, which promises to be even bigger and better. Next year’s conference will be held at the Gaylord Texan Resort & Convention Center in Dallas on Feb. 5 and 6. Register now and take advantage of early-bird specials.