210 Estate / Letting Agents helping each other

… a story of how 210 unconnected letting and estate agents help each other to be better estate and letting agents .. helping, guiding, supporting each other … here we go ..

Video – seems to be the hot topic of the moment (isn’t everything nowadays) so you see it it all the time in estate and lettings agency .. 99% of the time, the video talks about the agent, how wonderful they are, how brilliant their services, how awesome their company is.

The thing is .. nobody cares you, your firm or your services (apart from you, your boss and your Mum – but she would be proud of anything you did).

Would you care if the local solicitors practice went on line and published graphs on how many conveyancing completions they had done this month? How they were part of a large chain of solicitors? Or their solicitor practice opened late or early? Or their solicitors had won their equivalent of the ESTA’s this month? Or the solicitor had smashed their targets this quarter? .. be honest .. no ….so why should anyone else care when you chuck this stuff out about your estate or lettings agency?

Stop talking about yourselves, your firm or your services .. nobody likes anyone who talks about themselves. Nobody cares you have sold 5 houses in 30 seconds whilst riding a unicycle, they don’t care you are part of a network of 200 offices nor the fact your agency has been in business since 43 BC. Nobody cares that you post RM+ graphs showing how wonderful you.

You care, your boss cares, your Mum cares but landlords and homeowners don’t care ..

However, I do know what they do care about, what interests them …. their property

Just talk about the local property market and you will become the big daddy agent in your town or suburb. But how do you do that … how do you get landlords and homeowners to listen to what you have to say. Well the four main methods are …

1. Newspapers

2. Newsletters

3. Rightmove Featured Agent Ads

4. Social Media

If recall, the name of this technique to attract homeowners and landlords to your agency by talking about the local property market and become the local property guru is called ‘Landlord and Vendor Farming’ .. why that name .. because you farm potential clients .. not hunt them.

All the agents who are passionate about this technique belong to a Facebook group called ‘Landlord Farming Club‘. (we shortened it to this as it was a bit of a mouthful otherwise).

Its a Facebook group of 210 letting and estate agents – all of whom adopt the landlord and vendor farming principles and share with each other best advice, tips and guidance. Its like being in a big club and everyone wants to be there – the help everyone gives is truly awesome and I am very proud of all the participants who freely give advice and opinion away for free

The hot topic in the ‘Landlord Farming Club‘ group in Facebook is the use of video to get the message (of being the local property expert) across on social media. Not how they don’t talk about themselves, or their firm or their services

In the Facebook Group, we have had webinar training sessions on the best ways to video, the topics for the videos, how to write the content for the videos. We have even had some idiot guides written between us .. and just look at the results …. have a look at some of the stuff we are helping each other to improve on. Agent helping agent. I am so proud of what we have achieved between us, that ordinary agents, just like you, with the mutual help of fellow agents, can produce videos like these ..

Kate in Cardiff ….

(link to Kates video – https://youtu.be/BAq-Fgkrq_M )
Jeremy in Uxbridge

(link to Jeremy’s video  https://youtu.be/fA5IjGFmZGw )
Spencer in Docklands

(link to Spencer’s video  https://youtu.be/mqvbh–hdzI )
Emma in Chelmsford
You will need to click on the link – its a good video though! http://vid.us/0ypo51
kind regards
Christopher
PS If you want to join the Facebook group, there is no cost involved in joining, but we have had a minority of agents in the past who have abused the group …  so if you want to join (and we would love like mind agents to join) – still find the group on FB and apply to join – but I also need you to drop me a note by email or text or give me a tinkle

Christopher Watkin

I teach, guide, support, mentor, consult, counsel, partner many hundreds of UK Estate and Letting Agents in their quest to grow their estate and lettings agencies business. Old school techniques of touting, landlords wanted leaflets, ring us for a free valuation, we have sold this in your street leaflets don't work anymore. There are too many competitor agents .. meaning cheap fees are epidemic, overvaluing is almost a norm to get the stock and don’t even mention about the online/hybrid threat. So a few years ago, I set about looking around the UK and spotted that certain agents (not many mind you) in certain towns were still seen as the ‘go to person on property’, the person the newspaper editor rang up every week for a comment and I looked at what they did and they were doing some thing quite remarkable…. Only one thing but they were doing it so well .. and reaping the reward in terms of decent listings and decent fees, happy staff, decent sales pipeline and exchange income, managed lettings portfolios in the many hundreds .. but more importantly, they really enjoyed the job… they enjoyed getting up in the morning and people looked up to them Over 400 agents around the UK are on a mission to change the way our Estate and Lettings agency profession is perceived and looked upon, doing it town by town, city by city. I guide these 400 agents, teach them, mentor them and support them to be seen in a different light, to be seen as the ‘go to person for property’, actually be the ‘local property expert’ and prove it. Christopher Watkin 07950 147 572 christopher@christopherwatkin.co.uk

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