Editor’s note: This article was created with AI from the episode transcript, reviewed and approved by show co-host Andrew Fogliato and edited for publication.
A new lead comes in. An email lands in an inbox. The agent is at a showing, driving, sitting in a meeting or telling themselves they will reply when they have a minute.
By the time that minute arrives, the opportunity may already be gone.
On a recent episode of The Leads Are Sh*t, Taylor Hack put the issue plainly: lead quality is heavily influenced by the quality of the response. That does not mean every lead is good. It means you cannot fairly judge the source until you know the response system gave the lead a real chance.
For agents spending money on websites, ads, guides, lead forms and CRMs, that distinction matters. More traffic will not repair a broken response process. It will simply push more people into it.
Close the gap immediately
The first problem is often speed.
A form submission captures a moment of intent. The person may still be looking at the listing, thinking about the guide they requested or holding their phone. Every delay creates room for another agent, a listing representative, a friend or simple distraction to take over.
The response does not need to be complicated. It needs to be immediate and specific.
Andrew Fogliato shared a simple text he could send after someone completed a contact form:
“Taylor, it’s Andrew. You just filled out the contact form on the site. I’m going to call you in a minute. I’m just going to a quiet space.”
Then he would call about 30 seconds later.
That short message does several useful things. It identifies the agent, connects the response to the action the person just took, explains what will happen next and makes the incoming call feel expected.
Hack described it as a text-and-call one-two punch. The text opens the door. The call begins the actual conversation.
Automation can help when an agent cannot respond immediately, but automation should support the handoff rather than become the entire relationship. The goal is to reduce the delay between interest and useful human contact.
Make the first conversation worth answering
Speed gets the call answered. The quality of the conversation determines what happens next.
Hack identified three things an agent needs to understand:
- Motivation: Why is this person considering a move?
- Ability: Can they make the purchase or sale happen?
- Timeline: When could they realistically act?
Those answers rarely come from firing three blunt questions at someone. They come from discussing the home, the location, the commute, the family situation, financing and what would need to be true for the person to move forward.
The point is not to force every contact into an appointment. It is to understand the opportunity well enough to choose the right next step.
A buyer who would act tomorrow if the right home appeared needs a different response from someone gathering ideas for a move two years from now. Both may belong in the database. They should not receive the same follow-up.
Find the broken step before replacing the whole funnel
When leads fail to become clients, agents often blame the ad, the platform or the lead source first.
A better approach is to map the process:
Ad or content → opt-in → response → conversation → appointment → client
Then measure how many people make it from one step to the next.
If plenty of people opt in but nobody answers the call, the ad may be doing its job. The problem could be response speed, caller identification or the first text.
If conversations happen but appointments do not, the issue may be qualification, value or the way the next step is presented.
If appointments happen but clients do not, the problem sits further down the process.
Fogliato described a campaign that sent prospects to a long seller survey. People started it, reached a difficult question and disappeared. Rather than abandon the campaign, the team captured contact information first and had inside sales agents help prospects complete the survey. The information remained valuable, but the roadblock received support.
That is the practical lesson: fix the step that is losing people before you throw away the entire system.
Measure conversations and clients
The same discipline applies to content.
Views, likes and comments can be useful signals, but they are not the final result. A smaller audience of relevant local buyers and sellers can produce more business than a large audience that will never hire the agent.
Fogliato summarized an old advertising idea that still holds up: measure customers, not responses.
For a real estate lead system, that means tracking the numbers that connect marketing to revenue:
- How quickly did the lead receive a relevant response?
- Did the person reply to the text?
- Did the call happen?
- Were the person’s motivation, ability and timeline understood?
- Was a clear next step agreed upon?
- Did the opportunity eventually become a client?
If those numbers are missing, calling the leads bad is easy. Knowing where the system failed is much more useful.
Join the conversation live
The Leads Are Sh*t is a weekly strategy lab where Andrew Fogliato and Taylor Hack break down what is working, fix what is not and test ideas inside an actual real estate business.
Join the show live every Thursday at 2 p.m. ET to ask a question, take the hot seat and stay for the off-the-record After Show, which is not included in the replay.
Register once and save your spot for the next live session.
Related Posts
Louie Di Benedetto: 100% of listings sold, 30% faster
In this episode of Built on Trust, presented by Carson Dunlop, Louie Di Benedetto explains the listing process that has kept his sell-through rate at 100 per cent in a declining market.
Lesli Gaynor: the agent helping people buy homes together
In this episode of Built on Trust, presented by Carson Dunlop, Lesli Gaynor explains how she built a business around co-ownership and why the upfront work is what makes it succeed.
Carol Foderick: 500 transactions, zero paid leads and the system that makes it work
In the first episode of Built on Trust, presented by Carson Dunlop, Carol Foderick explains how her 22-agent group runs entirely on referrals and why she believes great agents are created, not found.
Content by REM Bot has been created with the assistance of AI. Audio and video interviews, conducted by our team with real people, are transcribed and repurposed into text for those who prefer reading. REM Bot articles are reviewed by staff before publication to ensure factual accuracy and maintain editorial standards.
