As a brokerage owner or team leader in charge of recruiting, where is the number one source of recruits for your team or office? Where are you going to get the most recruits?

It’s an interesting question, right? You might think it comes from video, cold calling, sending texts, video texts — all the things we talk about in recruiting. I’m going to tell you: all those things play a part, for sure.

But the number one recruiting source for brokers and team leaders across the country comes from one area: referrals from your current team.

Just like agents, whose number one source of business is their SOI — their Sphere of Influence — our number one source of recruits is the same.

It comes from your own version of an SOI: your agent body.

Now, what if your agents right now are not referring more agents? You might ask, “Why aren’t they sending me agents?” That should be your number one source of recruiting. Why aren’t they doing it?

A few reasons:

• You’re not close enough with them. Yo
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How many referrals would you like to receive next week?

If you could just say, “Hey, I want to receive referrals,” how many would that be? Now, everybody would say, “As many as possible,” but let’s be realistic. How many have you received this year? What’s been your average? You’ve probably been getting one a week. For most of you, that’s not the case.

Wouldn’t it be amazing if you just got one referral next week? What if you got two? Wouldn’t that be absolutely incredible?

You might say, “How can I start to juice this? How can I get referrals to start flowing to me regularly?”

We often think of it in terms of our spheres of influence, which is good. But we can also get referrals from another category, another source — and that is B2B referrals.

What’s B2B? Business-to-business. We’re always looking at business-to-consumer, B2C, but B2B is a powerful, powerful strategy for you.

Let me give you a good example. If I want to start receiving one referral a week, maybe two, what shoul...

Brokerage owners, I want you to think about the last agent you lost. I know it’s tough — I’ve been there. Losing an agent feels like a gut punch, like getting kicked by a donkey. It hurts.

When you think about that last agent who left, I want you to answer a tougher question: why did they leave? What caused them to go to another firm?

Sometimes they get led down a garden path and think the grass is greener. But often, and this is hard to admit because our emotions get in the way, the real reason they leave is because we didn’t have a close enough relationship with them.

And I’ll tell you something: Friends don’t leave friends.

That’s the reality.

You need a closer bond with your agents individually. And then you need to help them grow transactionally. Start with the relationship, then move to helping them grow their transaction count.

The only reason people leave is because they’ve been promised a path to more transactions. It’s rarely about the commission plan. Sure, that can sp...

What’s the number one way to grow your real estate business over time?

I’ll tell you—it’s simple, but it might sound counterintuitive. Most agents are chasing things that scale fast: big lead generation systems, expensive marketing campaigns, or complex funnels. But the truth is, there’s one simple action every REALTOR on earth wishes they’d started from day one:

Add one person a day to your sphere of influence.

That’s it. One person a day. That small, consistent effort compounds massively over time.

Let’s break it down.

In an average year, there are about 220 working days once you remove weekends, holidays, and vacations.

The average American has around 27 conversations a day. Out of those, you only need to turn one into a new connection—someone who agrees to be part of your real estate group or newsletter.

You could say something like, “Hey, I’ve got a little real estate group where I send monthly housing updates, DIY ideas, and fun listings I come across. Would it be okay if ...

Brokerages owners, you’ve probably heard me talk about this before, but I want to give you a different spin on it.

When I’m talking to agents, I give them what I call my “4-1-1-1 Strategy.”

For them, that means:

1. Lead generate for one hour a day
2. Set one appointment a day
3. Go on one appointment a day
4. Add one new person to their sphere of influence each day

If agents do that consistently, they’ll see transformation in their business within 30 days.

But what if I told you, as a brokerage owner, that you could apply your own version of the 4-1-1-1 Strategy to create transformation for yourself?

Here’s what I’ve found: the most successful recruiters in the country—the ones consistently bringing on experienced agents month after month—operate just like top-producing agents.

Most of their recruits—70%, 80%, sometimes even 90%—come as referrals from people already in their office. They’ve built such strong relationships that their agents become evangelists, out there singing their ...

Hey guys, as a real estate broker, we all know we should be recruiting every day. But sometimes we get caught in a mental trap—thinking that being overly assertive or aggressive with potential recruits is the way to get results.

There’s a right way and a wrong way to recruit.

The right way is by creating relationships, building value in your conversations, and genuinely developing friendships with agents in the marketplace. When you do this effectively, making calls, sending texts, or emails doesn’t feel “salesy”—it feels natural because you’ve built a connection.

The wrong way is sending cold texts, emails, or voicemails repeatedly without making any meaningful connection. Eventually, people shut down, and you hit a brick wall—you’ll never break through.

Start from a position I call “no recruiting.” Don’t start with a recruiting pitch. Build a relationship first. The worst thing you can do is try to sell too early.

We’ve all experienced it—walking into a car lot or furniture stor...

If you're a real estate broker, I want you to do something the next time you're in a grocery store. Look at the shelves and notice how many products say new and improved.

Now apply that to your own real estate company. Ask yourself: What about my company, what I'm offering to agents in this market, is new and improved?

If you can’t think of anything, neither can your current agents—and certainly no one outside your company can either. But this is the secret sauce.

We often think recruiting is all about commission splits. It’s not. If the lowest split was all that mattered, then the operator with the lowest split in your market would have every agent working for them—and we know that’s not true.

So what is attracting agents to join one company over another? It’s the tools, the technology, the services, the support, and most importantly—which company they believe can help them close more transactions at the end of the day.

Here’s the challenge: What can you roll out every quarter th...

People often ask me, “Jim, what’s the secret to recruiting?”

Here it is: spend one hour a day recruiting—just like your agents are expected to spend one hour a day lead generating. We tell agents to prospect daily; as a brokerage owner or team leader, you need to do the same thing with recruiting.

I call this the “Five by Five” system. It’s a proven strategy we use in our company and with our brokerage coaching students across the country to drive performance and success.

Here’s how it works. Within that one hour of recruiting, you commit to:

• Making 5 calls
• Sending 5 texts
• Sending 5 video texts
• Writing 5 personal notes
• Doing 5 social media touches

If you hold yourself to that standard, you’ll start unlocking new opportunities.

The next question is: what do you say? What should you be texting, saying on calls, writing in notes, or posting on social media?

The key is natural, authentic conversations that resonate. Great recruiting isn’t about pushing for an appointment eve...

Brokerage owners and team leaders — I have a question for you: What problem are you solving for agents?

If you're not solving a problem for them, there's no reason for them to come work for you.

The number one problem you can solve is helping them unlock the door to more transactions. Most agents are struggling here, so giving them a roadmap, tools, strategies, and techniques to close more deals should be your top priority.

But there are other problems we often overlook. Maybe they’re struggling with time management, technology, client management, building out a CRM, or having a reliable way to evaluate potential listings.

Agents have many challenges, and if we’re not addressing them, we’re giving them no reason to join our company.

All great businesses — especially industry disruptors — solve problems.

Think about the great companies you do business with today. They’ve solved a problem.

You need to be the problem solver.

Take a moment to reflect on your market. What are four o...

Hey, brokerage owners and team leaders. I’m going to do a quick role play with you right now.

Let’s pretend you’re an agent who just had a failed transaction with one of my agents. I’m going to call you—not text you, but call—and say:

"Hey Jim, I just wanted to reach out. I know you had a transaction with Bob that didn’t come together this morning. I got the bad news, but Bob told me you were an absolute pro throughout the process. This has nothing to do with you or your client—sometimes things just happen. I just wanted to say thank you for your professionalism. We look forward to working with you again in the future. And if there’s ever anything I can do to help, I’m here."

Now, imagine making that kind of call after every failed transaction where the other agent handled things well. What do you think is going to happen on the other end of the call?

Do you think that agent will appreciate it? Absolutely. No other broker is making that kind of call.

What you’re doing is laying a ...