Clients listening

How to Make Tough Decisions in Real Estate

Making tough calls and having awkward conversations in real estate – whether it be with colleagues or clients – is never easy. And sadly, toughening up and knuckling down to get them over and done with isn’t an ability that comes to everyone naturally.

So, if you’re struggling in the face of difficult situations, don’t worry – you’re far from alone. One of the biggest learning curves you have to make that takes you from a real estate agent to a leader is the ability to make hard decisions that are followed by tricky conversations.

These could concern anything from business strategy to finances to complications in the sales process where you have to let a client know that their property isn’t likely to sell in time for them to meet the terms of their unconditional offer on the property of their dreams. Nobody wants to have them, and it’s natural to not want to upset other people or let them down.

However, these situations need to be managed. Avoidance of problems isn’t solving problems – it’s a problem in itself.

As a senior agent or real estate business owner, making these decisions can be pretty lonely. Despite this, there are a couple of rules you can follow that will keep you on top of the difficult calls:

Play it Straight

No matter how easy it might be to tell people what they want to hear, it’s not always going to help you in the long-run. If you’ve got a difficult conversation to have with someone, whether it be professionally or in your personal life, you need to have it, then manage the fallout.

At the end of the day, after all the sales and commission, you need to be able to look to your moral code, stand in front of the mirror and be happy with who you see staring back.

Delivering Bad News To Clients – Pro Tips

Stay Transparent in All You do

Being abrupt and secretive with clients might lead to a bigger pay-check, but it’s not necessarily going to stick well with your moral code. If you’re struggling with what to do, make sure you act with transparency and keep your decisions within a framework of honesty. Focus on building relationships with people, not the quick wins.

You need to remain aware that the conversations you’re having with your team members and clients won’t just be left in the meeting room – they’re going to have a flow-on effect. So, it’s your job to stay straight, remain transparent and keep shooting for that originating outcome.

Act Quickly

Your team are going to understand that decisions take time, but they also need to know that the decisions you’re making are for the greater good of the business.

Additionally, if you take too long to make decisions, you might leave them thinking you don’t care enough. You need to find that delicate balance between being too hasty and taking too long, remembering that clients and your team are counting on you to make the right call.

Negative tenant reviews

How to Manage and Prevent Negative Tenant Reviews

It might come as a surprise, but research shows that 85% of consumers actually trust online reviews as much as they would a recommendation from a friend or family member. And, as a real estate professional, that can have a huge impact on your business. Why? Because any potential tenants who are considering leasing a property under you, or requesting property management services, might be persuaded by something they read online.

Positive reviews are fantastic news, but what happens when you get one that’s negative? This isn’t only going to damage your business immediately – it can have a substantial knock-on effect to your reputation down the line.

For this reason, it’s important to understand how you can manage and prevent bad reviews from tenants. Read on to learn how:

Preventing Negative Reviews

Make Your Service Tenant Focused

The more focus you place on your tenants, the stronger the relationship you’ll build with them. If you have open communication channels, they’ll be likely to bring their concerns and grievances to you before posting them online.

If you receive a complaint from a tenant, the first thing you should do is listen to their concerns patiently, following up with how you might be able to resolve them. This will help out hugely in your day-to-day role too, as happy tenants are much more likely to make on-time rent payments.

Request Feedback by Email

Periodically send out emails to your tenants to request feedback. This will give you the opportunity to isolate any negative reviews before they’re taken online and start to damage your reputation.

If the feedback you receive actually ends up being positive, you could always ask your tenant if they’re happy with you using it as a testimonial for your website. Furthermore, you could always ask them to copy and paste their feedback onto a public forum such as Google, Facebook or Rate My Agent, as this will help to bolster your brand and build trust with potential new tenants and landlords.

Encourage Tenants to Leave Positive Reviews

If you’ve had a couple of negative reviews, an influx of positive ones can help to lessen the damage. Additionally, if a tenant goes onto a review site to leave a negative review, seeing a large number of positive reviews might dissuade them into thinking their bad experience was a one-off. This could drive them to get in touch with you directly to solve their issue.

Responding to Negative Tenant Reviews

If you’ve received a negative review from a tenant, there are a couple of actions you can take to mitigate the damage.

Quickly Locate and Address Negative Reviews

The longer you take to respond to a bad review, the more people are going to see it. As a result, you need to address them quickly and effectively. If you don’t, the damage to your brand and bottom line will begin to stack up.

You can tackle this issue by regularly monitoring any online channels you have that reviews can be left on. This can either be done by checking in once a day or setting up real-time alerts, so you get a notification when someone leaves a review.

Remain Professional and be Empathetic

If someone’s leaving you a negative review, it might come across as an attack to your business, so it’s understandable for you to get defensive. However, to best handle the situation, you need to remain calm and put yourself in the tenant’s shoes. You shouldn’t take it personally – instead, you should view it as an opportunity to solve a problem a tenant is experiencing. You need to realise that a tenant is only going to leave you a negative review if they’re incredibly upset or frustrated.

When you respond to their review, you need to empathise with them and show them you understand the problem they’re facing. Apologise for any damage or inconvenience that’s been caused to them and keep your replies short and to-the-point. This will help to avoid an endless chain of messages that go back and forth.

Handle Your Negative Review Privately

If you’re able to work out which tenant has left the review, it could be worth getting in touch with them directly to see how you help. After you’ve done this, reply to their review publicly, stating you’ve tried to get in touch with them privately to address the matter.

If you can’t identify them, provide your contact details in the reply to give them the opportunity to get in touch with you. If you manage to speak with them and address the core issue, ask them to take the review down. You should, however, be careful with doing this, as it might leave the impression that you’re only helping them as a result of the review.

Different demographics

How to Boost Your Sales with Client Demographics

The population of Australia is growing quickly, which in turn means that our suburbs are changing at an increasingly rapid pace.

As a result, it’s essential that agents who are looking to make the most of their opportunities understand the evolving demographics within their patches in order to maximise the returns they see from their marketing campaigns, both for their own sake and for their clients.

If you’ve been in your area for a significant amount of time, that puts you at a considerable advantage. If a client gets in touch for a market appraisal, there’s a good chance you’ll know the street, and maybe even know their property. This will make your client immediately confident in your abilities.

However, if you’ve had your finger on the pulse of your area for several years on a particular area, you’re likely going to notice the changes more than others. With property prices growing exponentially in inner-city locations, more and more young professionals are moving to the outer suburbs to commute and work from home, whilst taking advantage of the added affordability.

For this reason, you might have noticed that an area with a demographic typically around 35-44 now has individuals as young as 20 buying and renting property. If you want to make the most of your marketing campaigns, you’ll need to stay up-to-date with these changes.

Agents who work in areas that are increasingly welcoming younger families have changed their brand awareness strategies, too. For example, you could help to get your name out there by running community events focused around children, so people see you out and about, giving something back to the area. You could tailor these to a younger demographic by running more children’s events.

Agents who have worked in an area for a long time are more likely to notice demographic changes more quickly, giving them the change to optimise their campaigns to different age groups and personality types.

These demographics should also factor in investors, as you might be focusing your efforts on owner-occupiers, when there’s really a large market for investors looking to capitalise on growing property and rental prices. As an agent, if you’re not staying updated with changes in your area, you’re not going to be able to make the most of opportunities as they present themselves. You need to learn to look for subtle shifts and understand how they could have an impact on your suburb as a whole.

Contact Database

How Can You Leverage Your Real Estate Contacts Database?

Any good real estate agent will have a database of loyal clients, because the service you offer clients isn’t a one-time occurrence – it’s the start of a long-term relationship that could last for the rest of their lives.

However, building a large, robust contacts database doesn’t happen overnight and takes a lot of time and effort. Additionally, once you’ve captured your leads, it’s down to you to take advantage of them.

Fortunately, digital marketing can prove to be a valuable resource for getting in touch with your leads and keeping you and your agency top of their mind. To do this, there are 3 main channels you’ll need to keep in mind – email, social media and content. Read on to find out more.

Update Your Leads Regularly with Email Newsletters

Email marketing is one of the simplest and most effective ways you can leverage your contacts database and keep them engaged with your brand message. In fact, by 2020, it’s expected that 3 billion people will be using email across the globe, making it a growing opportunity well worth capitalising on.

With the direct access to your clients’ inboxes, you can keep your agency fresh in their mind, making them that much more likely to choose your services over your competitors the next time they’re in the market.

To do this, you’ll need to craft and launch a thorough email marketing strategy to build and nurture trust. Link to your latest blog posts, share testimonials and answer the common questions they might be struggling with.

Target Your Database with Social Ads

Social media is one of the most powerful tools you have at your disposal as a real estate agent. However, throwing money at promoted posts without a strategy in mind isn’t the smartest use of your hard-earned cash.

Your database is likely already aware of your services, so create a series of ads to build their awareness of your services. If you can get these ads in front of your audience and use them to create custom audiences, you’ll be able to massively increase your ad profitability.

So, whether they’re looking to buy or sell property, using social ads will keep your brand at the front of your contacts’ minds.

Adding Value with High-Quality Blog Content

Not only will producing high-quality blog content help you to establish yourself as an authority in the market, you’ll also be able to promote your expertise and boost your organic search engine traffic.

Before starting blogging, you should have at least a loose strategy in place for what topics you’re going to discuss. Consider the problems your target audience is likely facing on a daily basis, such as how to know when the right time to sell is, or how to determine the real value of a property. Build content around this and you’ll be able to offer your readers a valuable resource that helps them work around their problems.

Agent mistake

How to Regain Client Trust When You Make a Mistake

Trust takes a long time to build, but it can be damaged or completely broken in seconds. That’s all it takes. But if you’ve made a mistake and lost the trust of your client, don’t worry – almost every real estate agent reading this article right now has had this happen to them at least once in the past.

Nobody likes owning up to their mistakes, and it’s easy to get defensive when you make them and try to bury them. There is, however, good news – even the biggest of mistakes don’t have to leave a permanent black spot on your real estate career. If you’ve found yourself in a sticky situation, here’s what you can do to rebuild the trust of your manager and clients.

1) Own Your Mistake

It’s already happened, and nothing you can do now will change that. As a result, the most important thing you do next is how quickly you own up to the mistake you’ve made. This will help to minimise the damage to your working relationships.

The worst thing you can do is just leave the mistake without addressing it at all, so as soon as it’s happened, contact your manager and let them know. Stick to the facts, don’t make excuses, and don’t make it all about you. Talk them through what’s happened and try to have a few solutions ready to let them know you’re already on top of the situation.

2) Apologise to Them

Let’s face it – you’ve made a mistake and that’s your fault, so you need to apologise. Your manager is aware, and they’re potentially upset with you. Bear in mind, however, that there are right and wrong ways to apologise. If done correctly, it should come in 3 parts – admitting to your mistake, apologising for it, and showing you’re aware of what you should do differently in the future.

3) Fix the Problem

If you want to quickly regain your manager’s trust, you shouldn’t simply pass the problem to someone else to fix. You’ve owned the problem and apologised for it, so now you need to fix it. You might need a bit of help if it’s a complex issue, and that’s totally okay, but you should make them completely aware that you want to solve this yourself, as it will help you to avoid making the same error in the future.

The quicker you can own your mistake and rectify any damages, the faster your manager will stop dwelling on it.

4) Address the Root Cause

Why did the problem occur, and what could you have done to avoid it? Reflecting on the issue is an important step and it’s often easier to do once some time has gone by.

Use the benefit hindsight gives you to identify any patterns in your professional performance or working behaviour that might be sparking these kinds of mistakes. After you’ve done this, address how you can change in the future and implement measures to reduce the chance of them happening again.

5) Share Your Experience with Your Peers

After all, you are part of a team. Use your reflection to give your colleagues some insight on your mistake, why it happened and what you did to fix it. Just as you’re using hindsight to stop the same mistake occurring again, they can use your experience to grow professionally and avoid making it in the first place.

SMS

Texting Gaining Popularity for Client Communication

US research has shown that texting between real estate agents and clients is increasing in popularity, with it becoming a more and more acceptable means of communication. In some situations, it’s even been shown that the right text at the right time could have a positive effect on the sales process.

One study of over 500 consumers and 350 real estate agents found that over 75% of clients thought that texting had the ability to boost the selling process, with 87% of real estate professionals planning to factor texting into their communication strategy over the next 5 years.

However, the report does warn that while texting has its benefits, it shouldn’t be used constantly. It’s about sending the right message at the right time.

The report showed that roughly 45% of property buyers thought texting was an appropriate means of communications in the following situations:

  • When connecting through other channels isn’t working
  • Time-sensitive notifications
  • Status updates
  • Crucial deadline reminders
  • Appointment reminders
  • Notifications on any missing documentation

However, the report also showed that texting could damage sales relationships if not used appropriately. Under 30% of buyers and sellers believed texting to be appropriate in the following circumstances:

  • Saying hello (19%)
  • Happy birthday greetings (26%)
  • Sales promotions (29%)

There’s growing evidence that text messaging fits in well with Australian clients’ busy, on-the-go digital lives, with the research above proving to be an invaluable tool for real estate agents looking to take their communications online.

Despite this, many real estate agents have spoken out about concerns regarding texting, with several difficulties coming to the surface:

  • Reluctant to use personal phone (34%)
  • No phone available for communication (50%)
  • Concerns about industry compliance and data security (56%)

This presents a huge opportunity for real estate agents to engage with their clients by mapping texting with other channels, as it can help them to improve the user experience and deliver a more personalised selling process. Research backs this up, showing that regardless of age, clients prefer online communication.

The survey also produced another interesting statistic that shows, whilst texting is gaining popularity, email is starting to drop off. Many consumers have expressed that emails can be intrusive, with the number holding this opinion growing over the last 10 years. In fact, for urgent reasons, text is already the preferred means of communication.

Texting has a long way to go before it can be considered a bona fide means of communication in the real estate industry, but some day, it could become the industry standard.

Content King

5 Key Points All Great Real Estate Content Needs

Although some of it comes down to ability, the majority of writing good content is a choice. It’s a choice to put in the right amount of time and research to craft a piece that’s relevant to your real estate brand.

However, each day people are taking the easy path and writing low-quality content. There’s far too much of it on the internet, and writing it isn’t going to do you any favours. So, whatever you’re using content for – whether it’s to bolster your SEO or answer common questions your buyers and sellers have, you need to make sure you’re doing it right. And to do that, you need to know the features that all great real estate content has. Read on to find out more.

1) Make it Original

Google loves original content, and so do your readers. If you copy content from others, you’re not only running the risk of your audience losing interest, you’re also tempting fate with punishment with Google – something that can seriously impact your profit line.

Original content means originality, so the ideas you include within it should be original. They shouldn’t be rehashed or rewritten versions of posts you’ve already made, as less and less people will read them and no-one is going to link to them.

2) Focus on Creating Powerful Headlines

These are the first things people are going to read. In fact, 80% of people will read your headlines, but only 20% will actually go on to read the rest of your content.

As a result, you should take the time to write great headlines. You might not get it first time, but if you write several, you’ll have an easier time finding on that works best. Don’t ignore them, as they’re the main driver of views to your real estate content.

3) Give Your Readers Actionable Information

What did you discuss in your last blog post? Did it provide information that your audience could action right away? The best content you can produce will give your readers a means of applying the information you discuss without directly telling them what to do.

So, when you’re writing your next post, give your readers assurance that they know how to best apply your material to learn and become better at what they’re reading up on.

4) Provide Answers to Their Questions

That’s the ultimate purpose of Google, after all – providing answers to questions. When someone types a question into a search engine, they expect to be provided with an answer, and they expect an answer fast. If you want your content to gain popularity, you shouldn’t purely focus on providing your audience with answers, you need to present it in a way they can access quickly by skim-reading if need be.

If you read any good piece of non-fiction, you’ll notice that the titles and subtitles increase curiosity, with the answers then delivered in the supporting information. Follow this structure and you’ll help to guide your audience to the material they’re looking for.

5) Focus on Accuracy of Information

Picture it – you’re writing an article for your real estate agency, and it’s going to be read by a large percentage of your colleagues and hundreds of your audience members. Shortly after posting, it’s brought to your attention that some of the information you’ve used is inaccurate. What do you do?

Your blog is a representation of your company and personal brand, so this could cause significant damage to your online reputation. As a result, you need to ensure that every statistic or piece of research you quote can be independently verified. By producing consistently accurate information, you’ll build trust with your readers, which will make them that much more likely to use your services the next time they’re in the market to sell their property.

What to Take Away

Don’t treat any kind of content site or blog you like lightly. Creating great content takes time and dedication to research and write. Answering audience questions, organising your content properly, using catchy headlines and being accurate with grammar are all musts. So, when you edit your content, ask yourself:

  • Do I need to take out any words?
  • Have I supplied my readers with the best possible information?
  • Is it ready to be posted, or does it need more work?
Vendor Expectations

How to Close the Gap Between Vendor Expectations

It’s a problem that real estate agents across Australia struggle with because, let’s face it – sometimes, bridging the gap between you and your vendor’s expectations can be challenging. Fortunately, there are a number of tactics you can employ to tackle this problem head-on. Read on to find out more.

Arrange a Set-to-Sell Meeting

This is also known as the expectation meeting and sets a clear foundation between you and your vendor before the open home. You should host it a couple of days before this date and focus on the standard benchmarks, such as the number of contracts you expect to be requested after the open home, how many buyers came through the first inspection, how many buyers request a second inspection and any feedback on your guide price. Finally, in a changing market, you should explain that the first offer can be the best offer.

Set Weekly Face-to-Face Meetings

Keep your vendor updated on progress by hosting weekly meetings. These should be in your office if possible to pull your vendor away from their comfort zone. You should talk over the progress of the sale by talking over the benchmarks we’ve mentioned above. From here, you’ll be able to make accurate recommendations backed up by the evidence you’ve received.

Book in your vendor meetings at the set-to-sell meeting, bearing in mind they should be weekly for auctions and fortnightly for private treaty sales.

Create Vendor Reports

Nothing will help to manage expectations like a detailed report your vendor can hold in their hand and review at their leisure. This report should contain a summary of all the key benchmarks after 3-4 weeks of your sales campaign. Details should include web hits, similar properties on the market, feedback from other buyers, what’s just sold, and which properties you’re in competition with. You should build this out into a recommendation plan for moving forward towards the private treaty sale or auction.

With iDashboard you can provide your Vendor with their own online login portal, so they can view information live as it’s entered into iDashboard.

Send a Follow-up Email to the Auction Reserve Meeting

After you’ve had the auction reserve meeting with your vendor, send them an email reviewing all the key points you’ve discussed. Not only will this be a valuable resource to your vendor, it’ll also help to reassure them that you’ve got a firm grasp on the sales process, as well as what’s going to happen on auction day.