The 'Quote Pad' Close

We break down the “quote pad close,” a simple but powerful technique for winning more listings by making it easy for vendors to say yes.

• use the agency agreement as the proposal, not just the paperwork, to create clarity and commitment
• leave a completed agreement (or digital version) behind so owners can act immediately without rebooking meetings
• position the agreement as your written commitment—fees, marketing, and actions clearly outlined
• remove friction by allowing clients to sign instantly when motivation strikes
• increase conversion by being the only agent who makes it effortless to proceed
• shift control subtly back to the agent while still giving the vendor autonomy
• apply the same strategy digitally using sign-on-glass tools for faster decisions

A practical guide to closing more listings by simplifying the decision process, increasing urgency, and making it effortless for vendors to appoint you.

Hosted by Lee Woodward Training Systems

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Transcript

Lee Woodward: 0:02

Hello and welcome to the podcast We Are Selling. My name's Lee Woodward of Realtair. Realtair is the one platform of choice of real estate professionals, allowing you to pitch, sign and sell real estate. Today's tip is in the area of winning business. The technique is called the quote pad close. The quote pad close came about from my own career as a young sales agent. My sales manager said to me one day, never leave anything behind. And what he was referring to is you've gone out there, you've done the listing conversation, you've won the owner's trust, they're close to going with you. You've explained what they would need to do to go ahead, which is the aid's agreement, yet what they didn't want you to do was leave something in writing behind that could be benchmarked against another agency, your fees and marketing and so forth. However, as a young agent, you do question everything, and I said to myself, what if I did leave something behind? What would that mean? So when I got to the end of the listing presentation or the listing conversation, and the owners would say, Lee, thanks for all that, we'd like to think it over and we'll come back to you. Now this is a classic scenario and everyone goes away and does their proposals and so forth or their pitch presentations and waits for that owner's decision. So as a pure experiment, I started doing the following technique, which is called the quote pad close as discussed. So I've come to the end of the presentation, I'd say to the owners, what I'd like to do now is put my whole quote in writing so I can leave it with you. Many agents say things yet they don't deliver, but if I put my whole quote in writing, you'll know exactly what it is that I'm committing to, what the fees are, what the marketing is, and the plan of action that I'm going to take on your behalf. And the owners would say, Yeah, that's fine, you can put the whole quote in writing, that's fine. That quote was the agency agreement. I would fill it out back in the paper and pen day, put in my fees, put in my marketing, and then I'd say to the owner, let me explain it to you in plain English so you know exactly what it is we are agreeing to. And I'd helicopter over the proposal that I'd I'd be their exclusive agent should they sign this agreement. And I'd go for that final close by saying, Now by signing the bottom of that agreement, that will activate my services and I would be your agent. And sometimes they'd go, ah, stuff it, we'll do it. Most times they wouldn't and say, yeah, great, thanks, Lee, you can leave now. Which means they are in control of the situation. They can peruse it, go over it. I know my competitors haven't left the agency agreement because they were told never leave anything behind. And what happened next was just profound. Firstly, I learnt that getting to the quote pad close moment was closure and conclusive to the whole meeting. Now if they went ahead or not, I did get to that stage and I filled out my form. I've made my commitment to the future seller of exactly what I would be doing. But when you are presenting five to ten times a week, there starts to be a lot of aid agreements floating round out there. And it'd be sometimes a week, could be three, four days, that I'd come in in the morning to the office and reception would say, Oh, hi Lee, this lady just dropped it in, she said you would need it. And I'd be like, Okay. And there is a signed exclusive authority that I and their agent. And then this kept going. There'd be one, two, three, four, five, six agreements come back. Some of them post them back, and you'd be like, What is going on? And I worked it out. I wasn't that brilliant, but I did make it easy to do business with me. What I believe's happened is they've interviewed four or five agents. All the agents have put their story together, their business case study, but I've left mine behind. I believe husband and wife got together and said, Oh well, we've said no to five agents now. What do you want to do? I don't know, what do you want to do? I don't know, they're all the same. Well, this one's filled out, let's just go with Lee. And because all they had to do was sign the bottom, post it or get it back to me, suddenly I'm appointed versus my competitor, you have to come back out, we're going to sit back down again, go back to fees and marketing. And they couldn't be bothered. They just wanted to get the property on the market, so making it easy to do business with you becomes the technique. Well, in digital today, we have an even better opportunity to use this exact same tested technique and allow them to sign on glass and activate our services. So give thought to your current situation. Right now, you might have presented, you're waiting for the owner to come back to you and say, Yep, we've decided to go with you, and then you say, I'm gonna send you the digital agreement by signing that that activates my services. That could be your current situation. Using the quote pad close, you would do it differently. John and Helen, thank you for your time. What I'm gonna do now is put my whole quote in writing with everything we've agreed to, what the marketing, what the fees would be, just so you know exactly what my commitment is back to your property. And as discussed, many agents say things yet they don't deliver. So what I'm gonna do is shoot that agreement through to you. You can review it, discuss it. If you've got any questions, give me a call. But by signing the bottom of that agreement, that will activate my services, my team will be notified, and we will start on our actions in preparing your property for the marketplace. I'll send it through to you today. So once they receive it, you are notified that it's been opened. And what if they've opened it three times today? We are now ninety-nine percent there of winning the business. But again, no different to the paper-based analogue moment, as it sits there in their inbox and there it is, and I can sign at any moment, they have the control, they have the power. But if it's easy to do business with you, and maybe they see a house they get stimulated about and they go, you know what, let's get ours on the market, and that is one single moment that someone makes that stimulated decision and they sign on glass, you would be appointed. So the whole tip is this use the agreement as the proposal that you are proposing to get started on the work. Yes, your pitch presentation proposal is the full sell situation of what you're doing, but when you think about it, the agreement is that final brilliant document, and the quote pad close is the technique that gets you closer to yes. And that concludes today's podcast. If you'd like to know more about Sign, which is our sign on glass real estate agency agreement and contract platform system, please call Realtair on 1300-367-412 or book a demonstration at Realtair.com. I'm Lee Woodward. Thank you for listening.