The December 15 DEADLINE is a Week Away!
Don’t Miss Out on Getting a Seat at Gary’s Session

EXCLUSIVE: Sneak Peek from Gary about his Saturday Session!

You need to REGISTER by December 15 to secure your FREE spot to hear Gary Keller speak at his special Saturday Session where he’ll give a sneak peek into the content of his next book! You do not want to miss out!

Extra perk: Register by the deadline and you will also receive your name badge in the mail and avoid the registration lines completely!

Facebook Sweepstakes: Six Days of Prizes for Registrants!

Have you liked our facebook page yet? We have six more reasons why it pays to be social! Every week day starting tomorrow we will be announcing a daily giveaway for Family Reunion registrants until our December 15 deadline. Everyone registered up to that day is eligible.

Please click here for official rules and regulations.

What Else is Hot This Week?
	Experience the Power of KW Culture Join Clint Swindall, professional speaker, trainer and consultant extraordinaire at our Cultural Summit. Celebrate the power of our unique culture and learn how to foster its growth in your market centers. Be sure to select Cultural Summit as an item when registering!
	Put Your BEST Foot Forward Red Bash is where the best of the best get the opportunity to strut their stuff for their Keller Williams Family! Do you have what it takes? Click here for full submission guidelines.
	Looking for a Roommate? If you’re hoping to find a roommate to save some money or you’re having trouble getting into a hotel close to the Convention Center, be sure to check out our new Roommate Request Board! Click here to find other attendees looking for a roommate.

ARLINGTON, VA – Since 2008, when the first of four benefit fundraisers was held, the agents from the Keller Williams Arlington market center have raised approximately $150,000 for the Arlington Food Assistance Center (AFAC).  With their annual party extraordinaire, the agents have accomplished their mission to help the Arlington Food Assistance Center to pay off the mortgage on its food warehouse and distribution center.

KW Agent, Gayle Fleming with guest speaker Andy Shallal

The event is held each November at the Clarendon Ballroom, a local hot spot. Local and national politicians have attended. Television celebrities such as HGTV’s Sabrina Soto, and The Chew’s Chef Carla Hall have been special guests and auction items have been donated by the likes of Oprah Winfrey and Chris Rock. This year they were able to secure tickets to the sold out Broadway musical, The Book of Mormon as one of the live auction items!  All this has made the “Pay It Forward Pay It Off!” fundraiser one of the “must attend” events of the year.

Congressman Jim Moran and Redskins legend Gary Clark were in the house this year and the Mistress of Ceremony was the lovely television anchor, Cynne Simpson from ABC7/WJLA.  Great food, wonderful live entertainment and serious bidding during the auction kept the party lively from beginning to end.  “We had no idea when we started brainstorming about a fundraiser at a KW Cares meeting in the summer of 2008 that a bunch of full-time real estate agents could pull off something so fabulously successful and raise so much money for such a worthy organization.” These are the words of Keller Williams Arlington agent Gayle Fleming, who along with a core group of dedicated agents worked tirelessly to make the event a success each year. The 2011 event on November 10^th raised $45,000—the most ever from a single event.

They were rewarded when Beth Kiley Johnson, director of AFAC’s Permanent Home Campaign, said: “We are pleased to announce that our mortgage has been paid and the funds borrowed for the down payment have been replenished.”  The Arlington market center has been the largest single donor to the $1 million campaign. “No community partner has worked as tirelessly on this effort as the Community Outreach Committee of Keller Williams, Arlington,” said Moran, in a Congressional Proclamation on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives in June.

Although this particular goal has been met, the Arlington agents are already thinking about what worthwhile community organization they want to help next year. Serving the community has been an important function of the Keller Williams Arlington market center. It has unified the agents in a common goal and displayed the culture of caring that sets Keller Williams Realty apart from any other company!

Mistress of Ceremonies, Cynne Simpson
KW agent Cristina Sison-Redskin Gary Clark
142 Live, Silent and Raffle items

KW Arlington agent Jowita Klein (right) and friends

Team Leader Pam O’Bryant and agent Kathy Fong

If I had to pick one defining moment in the history of Keller Williams Realty, it would have to be a conversation that I had with a consultant back in 1994, when I was trying to map out a strategy for expanding our company outside of Texas. He said, “You know, I’ve looked at your goals; I’ve looked at your organization, and it’s going to take about 14 or 15 people for you to hit your goals.”

At the time, I thought it was going to take about 60,000 people, and when I told him that, he drew an organizational chart that showed me how I could make it happen with the right 14 people who would hire and empower their own teams of people and so on. He was right, and he’s still a consultant for us.

This was more than a pivotal lesson in hiring. It was the conversation that sparked our company’s whole philosophy of succeeding through others, as well as our understanding that the people we surround ourselves with, make all the difference in our success or failure. Without exception, I find that the most successful people in real estate and in life are those who are very intentional about seeking out and surrounding themselves with the very best.

I often think back to that turning point in our company’s history during conversations with mega achievers, so it’s no surprise that it came up when I had the pleasure of visiting with Greg Harrelson, founder of The Century 21 Harrelson Group in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

In 2010, The Harrelson Group’s 18-person team closed more than 700 deals. Even though Greg says he now functions as more of a coach for his team than as a real estate agent, he personally closed more than 100 of those deals. At the age of 40, he’s clearly doing a lot of things right and has been very focused on surrounding himself with the right people. His passion at this point in his career is simply to fuel the success of those in his inner circle.

Here are some of the highlights of our conversation:

On standing on the shoulders of giants

At the age of 27, after four years of working for his Dad’s real estate team, which was doing about 120 deals a year, Greg says “The ego was kicking in and I started seeing that there was a lot of upside in me becoming the No. 1 decision-maker on the team. My Dad agreed and the next thing you know, we are doing 160 deals a year, 180 deals a year, 240 deals a year, 300 deals a year, 330 deals, all the way up to 484, which is the number of deals we closed in 2004, the year my Dad retired.  And that was my mission – a secure retirement for him and my Mom. I recognized that he brought me into this business and he guided me and trusted me and supported me when I was going in all of these different directions. He was my No. 1 team man and we did it together to 484 deals. My next goal was to build a team with the highest per-person production in our market.”

On leverage

“Tony DiCello was my coach when he was with The Mike Ferry Organization and one day we divided my day into income-generating activities and income-servicing activities. Once I looked that list I declared that I would never do income servicing activities again, and that concept now carries through my entire team. Income generators do nothing but generate and income services do nothing but service. Our current teams consists of eight listing agents, six buyers agents, a closing coordinator who takes over once the contract is signed, a listing coordinator who is currently handling 550 active listings, a broker/manager, and an executive assistant.  ”

Continue reading ‘Are You Surrounded by the Best?’

With more than 10 million books sold and over fifty years of experience under his belt, Harvey Mackay has plenty to offer in the way of sales advice. I was lucky enough to receive an advanced copy of this legend’s most recent book, The Mackay MBA of Selling in the Real World, which recently landed the No. 1 spot on the Wall Street Journal’s Best Seller list, and would like to share an aha.

In the book, Mackay tells of his experience seeing Billy Crystal’s one-man show, 700 Sundays, not once, but twice. “Both were sensational!” He talks about Tony Bennett singing the same song, over and over and over again, for more than fifty years. “It’s exciting every single time!” To Mackay, these guys are pros. Every show is treated as the one-and-only time they will ever perform. Even though the audience knows there were seven, thirty-two or 119 shows before the one they’re seeing, there’s no contest this is the best performance yet.

Mackay credits his aha moment of this working model to his college golf coach, who said: “Every drive you hit… every approach shot you make… every putt you stroke… you say to yourself, ‘This is the last drive I will ever hit. This is the last approach shot I will every make. This is the last putt I will ever stroke. Therefore, it better be my best.’ ”

Sales is repetitive. That’s all there is to it. Your only option is to be completely present in every single conversation you have about your business. You must be passionate and treat every opportunity as if it is your last. Every potential client must be treated as a precious resource. It’s easier said than done. Time and again when we interview the best-of-the-best we observe they aren’t necessarily doing extraordinary things, but rather bring extraordinary effort to the monotonous everyday task that lead to extraordinary results.

What are the areas of your business where you are making a commitment to be present every time?

–Jay Papasan

p.s. As a thank you to Keller Williams Realty’s continued support, Harvey is giving us access to his book “Harvey Mackay The Network Builder.” I encourage you all to go check it out. Here’s the link: http://www.harveymackay.com/bonus/