The last few weeks have seen an increase in the number of clients requiring me to provide mentoring services to their sales and lettings teams as they look to adjust to more challenging trading conditions in the post Brexit era.
With over 40 years of experience in the sector, I have seen a number of economic cycles and, whilst Brexit is a new situation, the challenges of a market where transactional volumes are reducing and buyers are better placed as the drivers of the market, is not, and a few key changes of approach can bring huge improvements in performance.
The lettings market remains instruction led although pricing and affordability are to the fore and key to securing transactional volumes. The ability to win instructions in a crowded marketplace is paramount.
Visits to several agents in recent weeks has left me horrified at the inept and casual approach undertaken by many to handling applicant enquiries. In one business, I calculated that it was effectively costing £200 to obtain every applicant (simply divide the monthly running costs by the number of applicants registered that month) and yet many were being registered without full names, addresses, contact info and certainly without any understanding of their buying or renting motives, ability to transact etc.
At £200 an enquiry, the business soon came to the conclusion that it needed to do better!
A combination of lax management plus over reliance on software and the internet has seen many agents simply stop communicating properly with customers, customers who have seemingly, in many cases, just become an anonymous number in a system.
This complacency is a huge threat to a business and, with the growth of cheaper alternatives in the market, the need to demonstrate and provide added value has never been greater.
Some basic sales skills development wouldn’t go amiss in many organisations.
Of course, tight cost control is also paramount (as it should always be) and I am working with several clients on restructuring their businesses to be more effective and cost efficient going forward.
I have also been working on a number of new websites for clients, writing punchy, SEO friendly copy to promote their businesses. I am still amazed at the number of businesses who still haven’t got fully mobile responsive websites, an absolute necessity in today’s mobile driven world.
I have also been running various training and coaching sessions based on my “Mind Your Own Business” programme that is enabling business managers to create a business plan and manage their teams to deliver the required results.
Consumer Protection Regulations have come to the fore recently with a couple of successful prosecutions of estate agents, prosecutions that could and should have been easily avoided. Coupled with Money Laundering compliance these regulations present agents with challenges that need addressing. I regularly run audits and courses for a number of clients and will be running another open course in London on November 2nd. Details can be found here:
Lastly, I continue to provide content and social media support to over twenty businesses, providing content on their websites and giving them daily exposure via Facebook and Twitter, all of which drives traffic and engagement. Half of these clients also engage me to produce a monthly e-newsletter in a similar format to Communique and which enables them to keep in touch with thousands of clients and customers, past, present and, hopefully, future!