In a daring transfer to begin the brand new yr, a SERHANT. consultant pitched the brokerage’s coaching and training applications to BHS CEO Bess Freedman, though BHS already has its personal in-house applications.
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Ryan Serhant is thought for making daring strikes. However this time, the dealer and CEO of SERHANT. could have overstepped his boundaries.
An unidentified salesperson at SERHANT. Ventures, the brokerage’s academic department, despatched Brown Harris Stevens CEO Bess Freedman a pitch final week for a “tailored” coaching program for the brokerage’s brokers, which would come with a gross sales playbook, efficiency teaching, a social media boot camp and mentorship from Ryan Serhant himself, in keeping with emails The Actual Deal obtained.
To make sure she understood the provide appropriately, Freedman reportedly requested if the deal was to pay Serhant to coach her brokerage’s brokers, and the SERHANT. Ventures rep stated, “It could appear unorthodox, however you’re understanding it appropriately.”
Freedman apparently wasn’t going to let that stand.
“There’s a wonderful line between being unorthodox and being a schmendrick,” she replied, using a Yiddish phrase which means “idiot.” “Thanks, however we’re going to move.”
The president of SERHANT. Ventures, Kyle Scott, informed The Actual Deal the provide was made in good religion.
“We don’t view the trade a lot as a collection of opponents as we do one giant neighborhood,” Scott stated. “We associate with dealer/homeowners all all over the world to assist prepare their brokers.”
BHS has its personal in-house coaching, advertising and marketing and expertise applications for brokers, together with BHSOne, its digital hub for agent design, advertising and marketing, schooling and extra, and a just lately unveiled metaverse and cryptocurrency coaching program launched in partnership with the Metaverse Institute.
Freedman informed The Actual Deal she maintains “unbelievable respect” for Serhant, however that she turned down his provide since BHS has already invested “a lot cash” within the firm’s personal advertising and marketing and expertise.
She additionally felt that Serhant’s outreach was very focused to her agency particularly.
“I requested different brokerages and he hadn’t requested another corporations,” Freedman informed The Actual Deal. “It looks as if he reached out particularly solely to BHS to poke a bees’ nest.”
Serhant informed The Actual Deal his coaching program already consists of some BHS brokers who joined of their very own volition.
This isn’t the primary time the 2 NYC-based CEOs have butted heads.
Throughout a panel at The Actual Deal’s New York Metropolis Showcase + Discussion board in Might, Freedman, alongside Douglas Elliman CEO Scott Durkin, advocated for the previous guard in actual property, emphasizing the significance of relationships, whereas Serhant stated agent manufacturers and advertising and marketing have been the spine of his enterprise, and a means for brokers to maneuver into the longer term.
Serhant and Freedman then went on to debate the deserves and pitfalls of actual property actuality TV, with Freedman arguing that it cheapens the trade (and specifically, represents girls in a demeaning means), whereas Serhant stated the platform allowed the trade to attach with a wider viewers and turn out to be extra related.
“We’re wanting in the direction of the longer term and approaching our enterprise strategically — which means with tech, content material, leisure, and schooling — and we’re doing this as a result of agent manufacturers and properties have to dwell in a searchable, social, digital strategy to succeed and promote globally,” Serhant stated in a press release emailed to Inman in Might.
“That is what we learn about media and tradition,” he added, “and that is what we’re making use of to our enterprise strategy at SERHANT.”
E-mail Lillian Dickerson
