The real reason why people dont use your Estate /Lettings Agency
Do you remember the good ol’ days of Lettings and Estate Agency?
When all you did was take a page in the newspaper. Put your properties in it and off you went. And the people just came to your agency to sell or let their homes
Sorry .. it doesn’t work like that anymore.
Stop being so starry-eyed and romantic about the old days and work out the way the real-world actually works today guys.
Bottom line is you are in a capitalist society and you want to earn money by ensuring people choose your agency to sell/let their property, so you can earn money from them, so you can provide for yourself and family the things you want and need (house, food, car, holiday nice things) .. to do that .. no matter how good you are… if people aren’t aware of you and your agency (in fact any type of business) .. they cant buy… hence most of you reading this go in for BRAND AWARENESS
Brand awareness marketing doesn’t get you the business anymore
Why? Because the problem is the world has changed .. that isn’t your fault .. but you can change to that new world.
I am aware (as I am sure you are) every bank on the High St .. but still I don’t swap banks .. it’s the same with landlords and vendors. Everyone knows you are there – they just cant be ar$ed to move
Why? .. Because you are “just another estate/letting agent”
But you know you’re NOT “just another estate/letting agent” .. that’s the problem. You can’t get people to listen to what you have to say and you need people to listen to what you have to say to prove that you’re different.
Why arent people listening? Time
When time is the asset, how do you tell your story on social media and give them something that they can read and watch very easily and very quickly?
Since the 1970’s and 1980’s, I believe we have lived through an age that can be best considered as “Heavy Estate Agency”, which required a lot of preparation work and a lot of time spent planning the advertising (it took a day to set the newspaper) and weeks to print and deliver your 10,000 flyers.
And don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with those, there is still a place for newspaper advertising and mass leaflet drops in agency. It’s just one way of telling your agency’s story. The only thing I am ranting on about, campaigning and evangelising about is that you as an agent just have to be aware of how people consume information has changed.
People (even your Mum) spend hours a day on the phone … social media to be precise.
… but all we have done is moved our crappy adverts “Come and Us Our Agency”, “Free Vals wanted” into banner ads and email blast campaigns on to the internet
My mum, you and everyone else doesnt go onto Facebook and LinkedIn to be sold to .. we go to educated and entertained .. get away from the drudgery of life …and then some f**king estate agent is trying to sell us something
No wonder we have a rubbish reputation when all we do is talk about how big our willys are, how many houses we have sold or our RM market share, how impressive our knowledge of landlord and tenant law is. Then we start to debate the online vs high street model. That’s like a Chartered Accountant arguing why Chartered Accountants are better than Certified Accountants … nobody gives a “f”
Now in the 21st Century, as we head towards the 2020’s, estate and lettings agency need to realise that we have to tell our story in a different way.. go from heavy estate agency to dynamic agency. We have to become digital marketers .. that happen to sell and let houses
How do we do that?
Without attention, nobody will be aware of your agency. But Attention on its own won’t get you the business like it used to in the 1980’s.. you then need the missing link between Attention and Securing the Business …and that is engagement
- GRAB THEIR ATTENTION
- ENGAGE WITH THE CLIENT (WHICH BUILDS TRUST)
- GET THE BUSINESS
The world has changed, the way people consume information has changed .. but the people themselves haven’t changed… they are still human
These humans, these potential house sellers and landlords … they don’t care about you, your estate agency, your services, what you have sold, your market share or anything to do with your agency …. All they want to know is that you care about them.
My intuition tells me every homeowner and every landlord is interested in the local property market and how it relates to their local property. I can prove this because if there were a brand-new for sale board on your street ….everybody that evening before getting out of the car would go online to and see what it was on the market for …. but they would not do that if the for sale board was half a mile down the road.
Time and time again over the last four years we have proved beyond doubt that to get the attention and the engagement of local homeowners and landlords in your local community all you need to do is talk about what is happening in the local property market about local house prices what is coming on the market what is selling what is happening to rents what is happening to yields. That is all you need to do it is that ….simply drip drip drip this fascinating educational information and you will get their attention and then their engagement (because its interesting to them) and from engagement comes trust …..and people do business with people they trust
Follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin or YouTube and will show how to do what I say .. I have taught hundreds of letting and estate agents and I can teach you.
Christopher Watkin
PS If you want to find out more ..we have a Facebook Group with over 900 memebers and 6,000+ posts on Business Generation in Estate and letitngs Agency. Its called “Landlord Farming Club” where we discuss all this in greater detail .. please ask to join if you want (It sounds lettings only focused -it isn’t – its both estate and letting agents and we should really call the group The Landlord and Vendor Farming Club .. its just we got used to the first name – so it stuck) ..LOLS!
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