Top Estate Agents India

As real estate agents who need to ensure that a steady stream of clientele walks in through the door, we usually have two main ways to get clients.

Option 1: We go out and get them or

Option 2: We attract them to us

For Realtors, Option 2 is always the better option. This is because we believe that attracting business allows us to stay in our comfort zone and also just works out better in the long run. What worked for professionals in the real estate business at the turn of the last century may not work along the same lines in today’s world. Let us check what is different now.

The Internet Has Changed the Real Estate Industry

The internet has completely changed how end consumers find information. People do not have to be advertised to or rely on bogus testimonials provided by greasy sales people. People can now go online and do all the research that they want, get all the non-biased and objective opinions of whatever product or service they are thinking of purchasing.

The buyers of today do not like being pitched to anymore. In all likelihood, people did not like being pitched to in earlier times too. It’s just that they did not have an option unlike the consumers of today. So, the sales paradigms have moved from a pursuit approach to an attraction approach. Which is good news for smart real estate agents.

By being smart with our branding and marketing, we have realized that we perform more efficiently and are able to close more leads when prospective clients approach us first. The numbers game always count. A lot of realtors cold call a lot of prospective buyers knowing that a few of them would eventually evince some interest in their open property listings. But then there is a vast amount of time and resources that needs to be allocated to the business of cold calling in terms of money spent acquiring databases, hiring competent salespeople to tele-call apart from other administrative costs. Let us look at the two sales options open to real estate agents in the 21st century.

Option 1

This is sales the traditional way. One needs to advertise, self-promote and network. Basically you ask for business. But in the loud, chaotic and complicated world of today, it getting more and more difficult to engage the attention of buyers who are already bombarded with dozens or even hundreds of offers on any given day. And consumers are getting very efficient at tuning out. The famous Marketer / Blogger Seth Godin describes the traditional forms of advertising as “Interruption Marketing”. Which is what it sounds like – You need to interrupt your potential client from doing whatever he was doing and make your sales pitch and pray to God that he is in a receptive mood to listen to you and probably think of buying what you have to offer.

Seth Godin also calls Interruption Marketers ‘Hunters’ which is actually another word for ‘Pursuers’. And if you are not aware of Seth Godin’s words, suffice it to say that he does not think much of Interruption Marketing and considers it as an outdated tool which rarely if ever captures the attention of your targeted audience. Whether Interruption Marketing is effective or not is not really that important. For us Interruption Marketing is just uncomfortable. Not because we are insecure or shy or self-conscious but because we do not want others to go through what we ourselves detest in our own lives. The way we understand, no one likes to be bothered when they are in the middle of something and to be sold something that they most likely would not be interested in. In short, if we are afraid that we will come across as pests then it’s likely that our targets would feel it too!

Option 2

Option 2 is the winning way of prospecting in the 21st century. In this system you create something that people want and they come to you to get it or atleast get some more information about your products or services. Your phone rings, or your email pings. You answer it and voila! You have a new client! This person on the other end of the line is someone who is pursuing what you have to sell, wants what you have to offer and is more than ready to hear your sales pitch.

When potential clients seek us out instead of the other way around, it gives us an edge and a great amount of confidence. But as always it takes a great amount of effort and expertise to create an attractive product or message that will lure potential homebuyers and sellers.

So let’s talk about:

Attracting Real Estate Business

In the real estate industry, business can come from multiple sources. We potentially get leads from (in descending order):

  1. Older Clients and their acquaintances
  2. Our Website
  3. Our Blog
  4. Just Being out there in the Universe with our antennae on
  5. Walk-ins
  6. Online Advertising
  7. Cold-calling
  8. Mass Mailers
  9. Just Plain Luck When People Stumble into our Bussiness Offline and Online

Just because we prospect clients “passively” does not mean we are passive when we start working on a requirement! Far from it. We believe our ‘closing ratio” is high because we are not disrupting someone with our message.

Yes, we work on an attraction-based model. This model may be more subdued than the aggressive in-your-face marketing tactics of yore but that does not make the model wrong. In fact, as research proves, we are very very right in our approach!

Chloe Dodd
Chloe Dodd
Real Estate Agent at Gupta & Sen
Chloe is a real estate advisor with Gupta & Sen. With a combined experience of over 15 years in varied industries, she is a vocal and knowledgeable ally for buyers and investors who want to make informed choices when buying a property in India. With superlative communication and marketing skills, Chloe handles our PR, real estate marketing strategy and client management.
Chloe Dodd
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