Keller Williams educational offerings focus on agents as business owners
Keller Williams Realty Premier Partners dropped on the Vancouver real estate scene two years ago, and has quickly grown to about 250 agents. Its unique educational offerings may be the secret to its success, say owners and agents.
With both online and classroom-style seminars, the company is set up so that agents can gather as many tools and learn as much about real estate as they have the desire to do.
Online, agents have Keller Williams University, a seemingly endless set of career-building classes that focus on productivity, sales skills and career development.
The courses – ranging from several hours to several days long – are split into a few categories: one for real estate newbies, one for middle producing agents and the other for mega agents. Newer agents can choose from classes like CAMP 4:4:3 (four listings and four sales in three months), which covers basic skills, models and systems to launching a career, the Success Series that aims to maximize productivity by focusing on lead generation and leadership, and clinics for finding buyers and sellers.
Courses build on each other, leading to the "Millionaire Real Estate Agent" curriculum, developed by Gary Keller, that essentially teaches agents to become business owners, said Brian Combs, co-owner of the Vancouver Market Center. He and Patti Siebold, both former Windermere agents, launched the market center here.
More experienced agents may jump right into the MREA curriculum.
Access to the entire online university as well as several other KW internal websites costs $10 a month, but Combs said 80 percent of the center’s agents don’t use it.
"The question isn’t what’s on the website, it’s what’s not on the website," he said. "It’s up to the agent whether they opt to do it or not, but what is important is that it’s there for those who want to learn."
A more widely used tool that is open to any real estate agent in Clark County is Keller Williams’ classroom-style training classes. With few exceptions, there are classes every day at the downtown Vancouver office, and the bulk of them are led by Keller Williams’ top producers.
Some classes mirror online courses, but others include Guerilla Marketing, How to Hire An Assistant and How to Write Purchase and Sale Agreements, Technology Tuesdays, when all tech-related questions are answered, and lead generation workshops.
Keller Williams’ educational setup is exactly what caught agent Jill Ramsey’s attention. Prior to joining the agency in December, Ramsey was a top producer at Century 21.
The training, as she put it, is phenomenally innovative.
"I knew that if I wanted to take my business to the next level, I needed to join Keller Williams," she said.
A self-proclaimed systems person, Ramsey said the models laid out in the MREA curriculum clicked with her.
Combs said Ramsey’s story is not unusual.
When the market center came to Vancouver, 20 agents opened its doors. By the one-year mark, about 100 agents called Keller Williams home. Now at about 250 agents, a second office has opened in East County and a third is set to come online in March in Battle Ground.
About 15 percent of the agents are new to real estate, 20 percent have less than two years of experience and 65 percent are established agents who have moved from other companies in the area, Combs said.
Agent Emily Lazaroti helped open the office’s doors two years ago, moving from Century 21, where she worked for four years.
"It changed my life," she said. "I’ve learned how to run a business, not just do a job."
Now Lazaroti, one of the market center’s top producers, has a team of two assistants and a buyer’s agent and is able to handle a much higher volume of work. She works closely with three local builders and has become an investor with three rental properties, and will be taking on a leadership position at the new Battle Ground office.
"In this business, agents are not encouraged to hire help," Combs said. "We do. It makes more sense to pay someone $15 an hour to make fliers so you can sell more houses. Our agents are taught that they’re business owners so they should start acting like it."
Education around the industry
Training and education differ from agency to agency, but it is imperative at every agency, said Cheryl Williams, broker and vice president of Sundin Realty Inc. in Vancouver.
Sundin Realty agents train one-on-one with Williams from the get-go, aiming for extremely personalized coaching. Because it’s a smaller agency with about 50 agents, Williams has the ability to work with them on the basics of forms, listing, purchase sales agreements and costs.
Keller Williams’ educational system is by no means the norm, she said.
"We’re just interested in agents going out and servicing the public because that’s what we do," Williams said.
Most of the weekly meetings at the office are spent on educating and learning from each others’ experiences and agents there are "highly, highly encouraged" to attend classes sponsored by the county and state realty associations, offered by title companies and lenders and industry leaders.
At Prudential NW Properties, all inexperienced and out-of-state agents are required to take part in a three-week training course that covers basics such as prospecting, listing, presentation, buyer presentation and understanding forms and documents.
"It’s just about everything agents are involved in on a day-to-day basis," said Dian Lane, designated broker for Prudential NW Properties in Battle Ground.
After the mandatory training, agents there attend weekly one-on-one coaching sessions in the branches.
John L. Scott Real Estate offers training on several levels. When agents sign a contract to work for the company, they attend a series of group sales classes – most often at George Fox University’s Portland campus – with an emphasis on listing presentation, prospecting, open houses, working with buyers and techniques to start listing and selling as soon as possible, said Suzanne Fix, administrative assistant at the Vancouver East office.
At the branch level, agents receive weekly coaching with Managing Broker Suzanne Oakes and attend ongoing technology training and weekly business development classes that feature experts like Clark County Assessor Linda Franklin.
Fix refines the education process one step further, working with agents on the details of selling: Who to call to install a sign, what information to include on a website, where to find forms and more.
What’s in a name?
If you didn’t see any Keller Williams ads during the Super Bowl, you weren’t just in the kitchen making more nachos. The company doesn’t advertise.
Why?
"The name means nothing," said Brian Combs, co-owner of the Vancouver Market Center. "A sign isn’t going to sell real estate. An agent sells real estate."
The National Association of Realtors agrees.
"Buying a house is probably the biggest single transaction most people will ever make, and they want to do it with someone they trust," said association spokesman Walter Malony. "Their criteria for finding a Realtor are reputation, knowledge and trustworthiness and by and far, people find that out by word of mouth."
Each Keller Williams market center is individually owned and operated.
"When you think real estate, I want you to think Brian," Combs said, referencing himself. "I don’t want you to think Keller Williams – we have 250 agents here."
Keller Williams Realty Corporate Snapshot
Founded in 1983
Franchised in 1991
643 offices in the United States and Canada
72,594 active agents
About 1,500 new agents each month
$2.48 billion – annual commissions earned
$109.6 billion – annual sales volume
$52.29 million – annual profit share
