There are only 3 ways to attract landlords to your lettings agency.

If you have been a letting agent for over 5 years, I bet you had a good run in the 2000’s, you were beating them off with sticks (landlords and properties that is), then everyone jumped on the bandwagon of lettings. In fact I was talking to a lady only yesterday who said there were 4 letting agents in her town ten years ago, now there are over 40! I just want to clear up a whole bunch of myths about all of the different ways there are to market your lettings business and generate leads.

To put the record straight, if your lettings agency is 8 to 15 years old and has 200+, 300+, 400+ rental properties on your books but you aren’t growing your NET property book (aka number of managed properties) by at least 10% a year, if not nearer 15% to 20% a year, you are a business that is riding on the wave of previous successes. Sorry to be so blunt, but you know it’s true. You are treading water .. yes you are earning well from it, but you are treading water all the same.

So back to the cause, growing your lettings agency, the truth is there’s not hundreds of ways to grow a lettings agency, there are only three. So I’m going to talk about each of the three.

I was on our Facebook group for ‘landlord farming’, we call it Landlord Farming Club where we discuss things, share ideas, share wins, share and solve problems. Anyway, the other day the question came up about, “There’s just so many different ways I can grow my business, which should I pick?”

The truth is, there’s not hundreds of different ways. If you can look at it carefully there are really three ways to grow your lettings business. There’s:

  1. Eff-Oh-Cee
  2. Spending Money ie Google Ad words/Linkedin/Rightmove/Zoopla / Facebook/ Newspaper Ads
  3. Joint Venture

The truth is, to grow your lettings business you don’t need lots and lots of different strategies running. You, Mr/s Letting Agent, need a startegy that works.

Show me a letting agent who has got a successful lettings agency (which is growing at those 15%, 20%, 25% a year) and I guarantee you, there’s a concise and defined lead generation machine which generates 80% of their traffic, 80% of their leads which comes from focusing on these three techniques.

I have some letting agents who follow what we do, and implement the landlord farming technique themselves, without my guidance and support. Great I say to that, and I know some of you who have done that have been successful, but some of you haven’t. Some of you have even had the guts to email me and ask where you have been going wrong. If you fall in to that camp, you are doing it wrong because I can guarantee you right now, you are not doing the landlord farming techniques enough times and improving enough times to get really, really good.

To recap, landlord farming works because you talk about the two things that really interest a landlord … the local property market and where the next buy to let deal is in their town. This makes you your town’s Property Guru.

Landlord farming is not talking about the national economy, the national property market, it’s about talking about YOUR local property market. In the ‘Landlord Farming Club’ group on Facebook, we constantly talk about the first rule of ‘Landlord Farming Club’ … What is the first rule of Landlord Farming Club? Well, you have to be in the club to know that 😉

Rule one aside, which is something that takes minutes, yet so powerful, if you want more landlords to use your lettings agency, I guarantee and promise you it works, if you do it correctly. So let us return to our topic about our three different ways to generate landlords.

1. Eff-Oh-Cee

(FOC is free of charge) ie Free

If you watch my videos and read my blog on www.landlordfarming.com , in fact if you are reading this now, it’s free. It is a type of marketing called ‘authority marketing’. One of the core strategies that we (myself, my Wife and our dog Joey) run in our business is writing useful content for letting agents that they will find interesting and engaging, we then share it with Linkedin, Facebook, Twitter or Estate Agency Networking websites), because by being promoted through a whole bunch of the high traffic sites across the web, they in turn drive people back to my website. So this is free.

You would do the same, but talk about the local property market on a daily basis (or you ask me to write it for you) and that in turn world drive people back to your website.

2. Spend some money

ie. Google/Linkedin/Rightmove/Zoopla / Facebook / Newspaper Ads

So in essence, it’s paid for ads. What I love about paid is that it’s so quick. But it has to be right sort of ad, otherwise you are wasting your time right? Sure you’ve got to spend some money. Free is free but you’ve got to invest some time so that’s not really free if your time is valuable (and it is).

Paid is brilliant because literally you can write an ad today, have it approved tonight and tomorrow morning be generating leads instantly. It’s so measurable, it’s brilliant.

Paul Tobias-Gibbins of M+ P Estates in Essex. He is a ‘landlord farmer’ and has been doing so since the Summer (so he only 7 months into it)…he said this the other day about his Rightmove Featured Agent advert .. “ got 595 people clicking on my Rightmove Featured Agent advert in 7 days” .. yep 595 people .. most of you would be happy to get that half that in a year. See what he wrote below … (and if you dont believe me, ring him up and ask him yourself)

“Hi Christopher.

Just a quick email to update you on my progress with featured agents. In a 7 day period I had 595 views to my blog through featured agent on Rightmove. In addition the (newspaper) editorials are working really well and I have had a significant number of potential clients either call me or drop into the office for a chat regarding their property requirements. Last week we sold 4 properties to new landlords. Also as an estate agent I have seen a significant increase in valuations from this time last year.In fact it is roughly a 20% increase.

More importantly we have seen an increase in rental valuations up 15% on this time last year with a 95% conversion rate to instruction. Clients really like the no-hard sell, free information and assistance in helping them with their property requirements.

It would seem that knowledge is Power.

Regards

Paul

PS thank you for your assistance with the articles and blog.”

3. Joint Venture

Joint venturing or partnering up with other people who have the same kind of clients as you and having you promote to their list. One of my clients has a local solicitor pay for her newsletter to be designed, printed and hand delivered to every house in the town …and it costs her nothing. That makes sense?

What should you do now?

You don’t have to do all three at once.

The art is to start with number one, introduce number two when money allows, then drop number two and swap to number three, thus saving you time and money.

How should you do it?

Just start it, become a landlord farmer .. I tell you what to do here in these couple of three minute videos https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8EVjavxiDxinvvxrgaf8WjDHDztJe76F

… or you if you a new agent, with plenty of time but not much money, come on one of my courses, and I will teach you the techniques. The next course is booked up (late March), but there are a couple of spaces left on the late April course) (here is a video from five lettng agents who came on the January course https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDkVJR4KTdM )

… or if you an established agent, with not enough time, you can ask me to to do it for you.

The choice is yours Mr/s Letting Agent .. but remember this, what if another letting agent in your town becomes the ‘local property guru’, sets up the blogs and steals a march on you …. then you will copying them. Do you want to be the agent that is is copying another .. think about.

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

You May Also Enjoy

Breaking News

Breaking Property News – 28/03/24

Daily bite-sized proptech and property news in partnership with Proptech-X.   tlyfe the tenant App gets huge marketing boost from national team tour from the Openbrix team As many will know tlyfe, powered by OpenBrix, is the UK’s most innovative tenant lifecycle app, taking the stress out of the move in process and helping to…
Read More
Breaking News

Over Four Out Of Five Tenants Unaware Of The Renters Reform Bill

OVER four out of five tenants remain unaware of the Renters (Reform) Bill and its contents, according to new research. The data comes from a representative survey of over 2,000 private renters conducted by the TDS Charitable Foundation, which works to advance education about housing rights and obligations in the private rented sector. The Bill…
Read More
Estate Agent Talk

What is Property Damage in a Personal Injury Case?

Property damage refers to any damage that affects things instead of a person. This might include damage to your car, house, etc. As such, it is not regarded as a personal injury case. However, when an individual is injured when the accident occurs, the affected person can file a personal injury claim. A typical example…
Read More
Love or Hate Rightmove
Breaking News

Rightmove comment on new 99% first-time buyer mortgage product

Matt Smith, Rightmove’s mortgage expert said: “It’s encouraging to see lenders continuing to try to innovate in the mortgage market, even after the government abandoned its own plans to encourage lower deposit mortgages in the Spring Budget. This new product has the potential to help some first-time buyers who fit the affordability criteria, but are struggling…
Read More
Breaking News

Breaking Property News – 27/03/24

Daily bite-sized proptech and property news in partnership with Proptech-X.   Coadjute ahead of the game as they are already licensed to provide digital TA6 Forms to property stakeholders This week, the Law Society announced its TA6 Form will now include Material Information as per the the National Trading Standards Estate and Letting Agency Team…
Read More
Breaking News

Breaking Property News – 26/03/24

Daily bite-sized proptech and property news in partnership with Proptech-X.   Sharing Success: The Guild Conference and Awards celebrate Member achievements The QEII Centre in Westminster, London, was abuzz with excitement on Friday, 22 March 2024, as The Guild of Property Professionals hosted its highly anticipated annual Guild Conference and Awards. Under the theme ‘Sharing…
Read More