While the concept Mega Agent Expansion may just be entering the minds of many agents, Keller Williams is home to a growing group of mega agents who are already experiencing enormous success through expanding their businesses into multiple markets.
The reason for expansion? Greater profit potential. Simply put, your business can only grow so big in one place. And, for those agents who have mastered their lead generation and administrative systems, expansion provides an opportunity to drive profit by leveraging the systems already have in place. The next step is simply finding the talent to put them to work in the right location. The RIGHT who with a BIG why.
For some, this can mean expanding to a neighboring town where leads are already beginning to show up. For others, it’s meant taking their business across the country, to a market where the lead generation tactics they’re already using prove successful.
Why would you want to expand? It’s simple: profit. And not just through the profit share system. Expanding allows you to increase profits, attract and retain better talent and provide better opportunities for your team members and their families. In the end, you are deepening your bench, allowing you to fill needs with strong talent and grow beyond your reach. How and when do you expand? You expand when your systems and people are right; you expand where the right people are.
Expansion is not something that happens quickly, Gary mentioned Keller Williams as a good example. It takes 2-5 years to develop the 2nd location, then another 1 to 2 years after to add a third. Over the course of these years you will discover what is and is not working and be able to perfect it. Exponential growth starts to happen after 3, 4 and 5 locations.
The most important part of expanding and also the biggest challenge is finding talent. It’s all about finding the right people at the right time in their life. How do you find this talent? It will probably not be found with part-time agents. If will be with full time agents that want to take their career to the next level by not having to worry about all of the administrative tasks.
“Simply stated, Mega Agent Expansion is taking your administration systems and team and your lead generation systems and team to an additional location,” he said.
Keller said there are three big reasons to expand:
To increase profits;
To expand the vision for your business so you can attract and retain more and higher quality talent;
And to deepen your bench.
Keller interspersed his comments with stories about the early years of Keller Williams and the lessons he and the company learned as they developed the Keller Williams Model. “In Austin, we had two market centers and I resisted adding any more.” Eventually, he awarded new market centers in the area to other owners. “What’s interesting is that our business grew at the original.” The expansion didn’t diminish the growth potential, in fact, it enhanced it.
Keller told attendees not to give themselves a ceiling. “This is a wealth-building seminar. If you don’t want to build wealth you can leave.”
Based on his conversations with agents, operating principals and team leaders, Keller identified the four “myths” people experience when they think about Mega Agent Expansion:
“I’m an agent, not a businessperson.”
“Expansion is for companies, not agents.”
“I can just make more money with my current team.”
“My plate is so full with my current business that I don’t see how I have the bandwidth or resources to do this.”
Gary Keller talked about this at the most recent Mega Camp held in Austin Texas
Keller debunked the myths one by one. “This is a big, big opportunity,” he said.