People often carry with them business practices from one industry to another. For example someone who worked in the hospitality business and carries a customer satisfaction methodology with them when they go to work for a construction company. Sometimes it works, but sometimes certain business practices in one industry don’t translate well to another. The “call screener” in real estate may be lost in translation.

Call just about any office in town to speak to a broker and you’ll be greeted with, “may I ask who’s calling?” There are plenty of industries where this is needed but does this translate well to real estate? On the surface, call screening may seem like a necessary practice but it’s easy for the caller to misinterpret that phrase as the following:

“We don’t trust that who is calling is worthy of the recipient’s time so could you tell us who you are so we can put you on hold to make that judgement?”

Remember, people are giving you their money & they have a tremendous amount of choice. Why not turn this into an opportunity to deepen your connection with people. Go get a caller-id computer program that identifies the caller as a client, vendor, etc and associates them with someone in your company. Change the script to something like:

“Good morning Dr. Stokes, this is Kelly. Are you calling for David?”

Internally you may accomplish the same as before but you’re differentiating yourself, creating a deeper relationship and providing a richer experience.