Confessions of a Recovering Landlord

So what's the best way to get new business? By new, I mean new clients with whom you haven't worked before. 

In my business as a Corporate Real Estate Advisor (tenant rep), my ideal clients are companies which already lease office space in the Plano/Dallas area. Most of my competitors make tons of cold calls - especially agents new to the business. I haven't spent much time cold calling because it just seems to annoy people and reduce my chances of actually getting the business. Now it's entirely possible that I haven't done it enough to really test it properly.

Occassionally, I get business from people that have found me on the internet. That's very gratifying, of course. I spend time blogging and have ensured that keywords are included on my website. So it's good to see that it works once in a while. But I certainly can't live on the business that generates.

My main source of business has been referrals. Business networking groups, chambers of commerce, and past clients are the main sources of this. A fair number of these referrals aren't exactly my ideal client though. While I really want companies already leasing office space, many of the referrals are companies occupying warehouse or retail space. Warehouse is fine, but retail isn't. The reason why is because landlords of retail buildings usually won't pay the tenant's broker whereas that isn't a problem in office and warehouse.  

In building a referral network, I constantly hammer home who my ideal client is, but I think people hear "company" and "lease" and they don't really stop to distinguish office, warehouse, or retail. And that's actually fine because I'd rather have them think of me first and refer me than to not do it for fear it's the wrong thing. I can always refer those I don't want on to someone else.

So what is your experience? If you cold call, what's your magic? What do you say specifically to get the appointment? If you get your business by referrals, give us your method.

Thanks and happy hunting.