Design your dream Estate Agency.

MissMotivation

Floorplan software is not expensive. Less than £100 a month for up to 30 plans.....charging a tiered fee structure you should be able to easily afford it!

RacyRed

Estate_Agent wrote: »

Wow. Thanks so far. Some of you really don't like estate agents do you?

I had no opinion of them until I had to use one. Now I hope I never have to use one again!

Be aware that changing this attitude is up to Estate Agents, not us poor punters - read the selling/buying support threads on here for more insight into this

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I forget what else we do but its probably pretty good as well.

Wrong attitude! Try "I forget what else we do but we are always trying to improve our service"

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What else do I want to do?

Wrong again! Try "What else would you like me to do for you"

We will be doing a moving box for sellers and buyers stocked with tea-bags to binliners for the first day in the house. A six monthly email to every email address we have - unless they opt out - giving everything from state of the market to FTB advice etc.

Paid for out of your clients' fees - Don't you think that we realise that? Anyway, when you do the mail forwarding thing there is an option to sign up for junk mail and get a welcome to your new home box of essentials - don't know what is in it though, mine never arrived - if 2 never arrived I'd end up doubly miffed.

I'd like to look at sponsoring a charity for every sale.

A bit presumptious, moving house is horrendously expensive and is not going to be the time that most people feel at their most charitable.

You would be better off using that money to offer a slightly cheaper single tier service and ensuring all of your clients feel well cared for.

A lot of ideas will pay dividends over the next few years. I am a big believer in good sustainable growth not building a house of cards.

What I need - before the beans really start flying - is how to let everyone near me know about us and how good we can be, as well as any ideas I've missed.

There is only one surefire way, be so efficient and reliable that you get lots of word of mouth recommendations.

Here is a radical idea, charge the same fee for all of your clients, even those who have signed up with another agency. Why do estate agents think that it is reasonable for them to charge us for giving them a bit of competition? Might it be because it stops them charging us to put our houses on the back burner (while the EA concentrates on multiple agency properties) when they get our signatures on a sole agency contract?

Thanks for reading this far to those that did.

There ya go, a few more thoughts for you. Are you wishing you hadn't asked yet?

DVardysShadow

Estate_Agent wrote: »

Lots of photo's. We have 8-9 per property. This something I can definitely improve.

Not too many! As seller, I think that the phots should convey the character of the property and whether it is worth a viewing - they should not supplant a viewing! I like floorplans. After about 6 phots, the floorplan has a value which you could match with another 100 phots.

Estate_Agent

Thanks guys, like the info about floor plans.

Red, thanks for the feedback. I may have used the wrong language in jest, but I do agree with you in regards to 'what can I do for you'. This is really what underpins my idea of service and I didn't mention it because to me it's obvious.

The movers box carry no financial burden to me. If you are aware of the bounty packs given to new mothers, this is just the home version on steroids.

For the charity idea, it was us who would make a donation, not the customer.

Everything I am trying to achieve is in order to get the good word of mouth reputation. I have come to estate agency from my own business. We survived on word of mouth and were involved in business networking, which over time, gave us that good word of mouth advertising.

What I'm trying to do, is kick start that process.

As I've said previously, I believe in treating people as I would like to be treated.

Contessa

tootsmyboots wrote: »

do you know what, i have just pondered longer on photos and my advice is this: take honest photos. I have seen some pics that take it at an angle to hide/obscure something. Now googlestreet view is on RM, it seems pointless to try to hide shared driveways, double yellows, tatty car next door, bus stop outside.

Googlestreet view is a real help to me in revealing what the EA's photos carefully try to hide, e.g. busy roads, yellow lines, new development, on what was a cricket ground, now overlooking the garden. But, best of all, an electricity sub-station next to the garage in the garden!

potter78_2

Two things from me...

- Budget - If I tell you my budget is a max of £200k, don't only show/send me houses with asking prices of this or below. If you've got a house on the market for the last 12 months at £210-220k, why not show me the details. If I really want to see it, you can always check with the vendor to see if it's worth mine and their time.

- Be straightforward - I appreciate you're a salesman/woman and prone to some exaggeration, but if you tell me the recession has completely bypassed my local area, or a doer-upper would be worth £100k more if I spent £20k on it I'm going to disbelieve everything else you say which will make it a lot harder for you sell anything to me. The best agents are the ones who don't assume you're a complete idiot until proven otherwise.

Errata

For the charity idea, it was us who would make a donation, not the customer.

Think this through a bit more. Not every charity/school/whatever will want to be linked to an estate agents ! How about a team from your office doing charity runs/walks/covered in custard for something like Cancer Research/Sport Relief/Children in Need etc. T-shirts with company logo, sponsorship from [STRIKE]mugs[/STRIKE] friends and rellys, nice piece in the local rag with pics etc etc etc. Doing good and getting free advertising for the agency at the same time - win win situation.

Contessa

Be open at weekends-or at least have someone who can show potential buyers around a property. This is especially important when someone is looking for a property a long way away and may only have weekends free to view.
Display local maps, satellite, "Birds Eye View" and street view on your website. There is one EA in an area I'm looking to move to, hundreds of miles from where I live now, who doesn't offer these-if I see a property on RM which is also listed with another agent, I ignore them and look at the site of the EA which has those features.

googler

Errata wrote: »

If a property hasn't got a garage/drive/parking/garden, say so, don't just not happen to mention it.

You're kidding.

So the description will read, at some point;

"No garage. No driveway. No allocated parking. No garden" ???

and logically, it should also therefore state;

"No en-suite. No utility room. No hot tub. No decking. " .....???

Estate_Agent

Potter - I do this where appropriate, so thanks for reinforcing my thoughts on this.

Errata, I am doing a skydive, glasswalk and the three peaks challenge on behalf of a friends charity this year. Don't feel I can tap friends for anymore cash! But I will heed the message and give this more thought.

Potter, I don't like sales people. The house should sell itself. What I can do is the intelligent bit of matching the right person to the right house - if I have them. If someone says they don't like the red paint on the wall, that is an excuse and easily turned into is it a problem or are you not really interested? If they say the bedroom is half the size it needs to be, there is no point trying to 'sell' the house.

I want to give a service, not be a salesman.