Follow the Leader: An Interview with Krisstina Wise

This interview was one of the most successful in our Follow the Leader series. We're highlighting during the holidays as one of our favorite articles of the year.

If you make the rounds of real estate conferences or spend any time following real estate on social media, you’re sure to have come across Krisstina Wise and her brokerage in Austin, The GoodLife Team. Krisstina truly is a leader to follow, having transformed her small company into a powerhouse to be admired and emulated. Krisstina took some time out of her busy schedule to share some of the keys to her success. We’ll share our interview with her here.

RE Technology: You've experienced an explosion of awareness about your brand. What factors do you believe led to this?

Krisstina Wise: The brand really has taken on a life of its own. However, there are a few factors I can point to that contributed to this.

1) We were early adopters of social media platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter. We were out there in the beginning when social media allowed brand awareness to spread.

2) We put a lot of thought into our name and chose a good one. People like "The GoodLife." It's memorable and makes them feel something, something positive. And I think it's good that my name isn't attached to it.

3) We've had several small wins that have been great PR. It started by being awarded the most innovative brokerage in 2010 by Inman News. We've been recognized by Apple as small business power users of the iPad and most recently we've been named an Evernote Ambassador for Real Estate.

RET: I've read that you used exercise to transform your life. I also noticed that you encourage physical fitness for your entire office. Does this help you and your agents relate to your customers?

KW: Yes, it helps us relate to clients; but, more importantly, it’s helpful to us overall. Our first company core value is, “Healthy Body, Healthy Mind,” and at The GoodLife Team, we don’t break from our core values. To work here, you have to value health; it's part of the “good life!”

As with all of our values, I lead by example.

RET:  What role does technology play in your business? What are your favorite products/companies?

KW: If you’re looking for a specific website development company, I definitely should mention 1parkplace. They built our current site and have helped us immensely as co-creators of goodlifeteam.com. With all of our vendors, we have a ‘partnership’ type of relationship with them. For us, it’s not a matter of having ‘favorite products,’ it’s a matter of determining what problems we have to solve as a company and what technology partner is best equipped to help us do that. We research their products and/or services, we beta test and vet, we ensure that our values line up and only then do we officially select the vendor. Upon choosing a vendor partner, it is rare that we don’t customize a technology in order to make it work with our overall operation – and this customization piece makes it important that we choose the right partner, as most vendors don’t wish to build a innovative and collaborative relationship but simply want to sell a set product.

But, more important than any specific vendor, I think it’s our overall approach to technology that’s different. You see, other brokers might get into relationships with a bunch of different vendors, but their agents still have to go figure out what their options are and how to use them. At the end of the day, that broker isn’t providing much support.

At The GoodLife Team, my agents don’t choose any of their own technology. We only form relationships with the vendors we ALL use – so we have 100% adoption of the technologies we provide. This is better for our agents, because they’re only offered products that we’ve thoroughly vetted and we provide substantial training on the best practices for using the technologies we provide.

RET: Someone told me that you are VERY selective about which agents join your team. Can you talk to me about your selection process? I also heard about your "boot camp" for new agents - will you discuss that too?

KW: We don’t even use the word “recruiting.” We do work to grow our company, but we’re more about quality than quantity; we don’t want to be the biggest brokerage in Austin, we want to be the best brokerage in Austin.

We can avoid traditional recruiting because our broker brand is so strong – we know that the right agents will find us. Instead of recruiting, we focus our resources on development. We work hard to make sure that once agents join us they can be successful.

In order to be a GoodLife Team Agent, you have to be full-time, be selling, and be professional. Agents need to understand that they live and die by how well they perform. We are very selective in how we choose our people. There is a minimum of 3 interviews, and we give agents homework before they can even get to the second interview.

Our boot camp is an intensive training course. In it, we essentially want to convince new agents that they DON’T want to work with us. This weeds out anyone who isn’t driven and committed. The boot camp has about a 70% attrition rate.

RET: So, in closing, what do you think is the most important way that other brokers can become more successful?

KW: The thing that stands out to me the most is technology. In today’s marketplace, the transparency technology gives consumers means that any lack of knowledge on a broker or agent’s part is quite evident. So they’re demanding more from us. In this new environment, it’s tough for agents to figure out all the technology on their own and still focus on selling real estate. Thus, brokers need to focus on teaching and training their agents, rather than on recruiting.


About Krisstina
As the Founder and CEO of The GoodLife Team, she leads one of most technologically and philosophically advanced real estate companies in the U.S. When asked about winning the industry award "Inman Innovator of the Year" and being recognized by Apple Computer as an advanced technological business and power user of Apple products, you will hear Krisstina say, "Of course I am proud of being nationally recognized as industry thought leaders, innovators and early adopters. That being said, what I am most proud of is my Team of Professionals, and the collaborative commitment everyone has to taking delicate care of our customers. We are a 5-Star service company! Our advanced technologies are merely a way of delivering on what we do well…better. We do not innovate for innovation’s sake. Everything we do is always for the sake of the customer and helping them live their GoodLife."

To learn more about The GoodLife Team, visit GoodLifeTeam.com. To learn more about Krisstina, visit CoffeewithKrisstina.com.