Listing Presentation–or Marketing Plan?

Are you using the old term, “listing presentation” to describe the presentation you give to the seller to list the home? It’s over. The days of describing what you’ll do for a seller as a “listing presentation” just don’t cut it in this marketing world.

Today, savvy agents are presenting “marketing plans”, not giving listing presentations. Why? Because you want to describe what you’re going to do for the seller in action terms. That’s your special marketing plan. To get the commissions you expect, you must compete on “added value” issues. That added value is all about you, not just about your company. These added values are best stated in your individual marketing plan. Here are 5 points to remember as you create your plan:

1. It’s an action plan—what you will do for the seller

2. It’s specific—it has dates for what will be done and who does it

3. It’s not about what the company will do—it’s about what you will do

4. It is stated either as a checklist, as a calendar of events, and demonstrated in your visuals.

5. It has a section on pricing, but the pricing, or market analysis, is only one part of the plan

Show Them or Tell Them the Plan?

We agent types like to talk. In fact, many of us became agents because people told us that, since we’re good talkers, we’d make great salespeople! That’s an old idea today. Why? Because consumers are over-whelmed with sales talk. The client today just doesn’t trust salespeople because they have a good ‘sales spiel’.

If you’re finding it increasingly difficult to list properties at the right price, it may be because you’re working too hard trying to talk the seller into it, and are not working hard enough to show a seller into it. Sellers, like all of us, believe what they see, not what they hear.

Go visual. Instead of trying to tell a seller what you know to be true, back up your statements with statistics, graphs, facts, etc. You do this already in your market analysis. But, most agents don’t do this with the rest of their marketing plans. Start now gathering information to back up your chosen marketing strategies. For example, if you’ve found, through your experience, that open houses do not sell that particular home, start keeping statistics of your open house visitors, their needs, and what happened to them during their buying cycle. You want to provide sellers the information they need to make good decisions, and to support your marketing plan.

Tell them What You’re Going to Do—Show them Why, and Show them What Worked

In a recent study of buyers visiting open houses, only seventeen percent accepted the claims of the agent holding the home open. The other eight-three percent sought a second opinion! So, back up your claims with testimonials, statistics, pictures, graphs, and history. You’ll see a dramatic rise in your marketable listings. You’ll have enthusiastic clients forever. You will have told the truth attractively!

For a complete sellers’ process, including marketing plans, see Your Client-Based Marketing System.