TheBusiness
Julian O’Dell is founder of TM Training & Development
TheDilemma
JULIAN SAYS… Agents often experience a decrease in new applicants registering in the summer and thus a potential reduction in agreed sales, leading to the need for a spectacular autumn to redress the balance. Most recognise that simple ‘order taking’
by staff when dealing with applicants was acceptable (though far from best practice) in the buoyant market. However, in the current and likely future climate, skills have to be sharpened, but many companies are slow to do so leading to a worrying sales performance. The ‘Mystery Shopper’ exercises we carry
out are enlightening often for the wrong reasons. This a direct transcript of a recent telephone conversation between a hot applicant and an estate agent. “Good Morning (Company Name Given)” “Hi. I’m looking to move to your area urgently – can you help?” “No problem. Your name is Sir?” Name given “What are you looking for?” “Probably a fl at up to around £200,000…” “Flats up to £200k yeah?” “Yes.”
“Can I take an email address?” Email address given. “No problem at all. I’ll email you.” “Thank you very much.” “Take care.” “Bye.” “Bye bye.” It is unlikely that this negotiator woke up
that morning and decided to do their job badly, but that is what happened. Had this been a real applicant, what a terrible way to be dealt with! The negotiator failed to give their name during the conversation making it all rather cold and impersonal. No interest was shown in the customer as a human being. No contact number was requested guaranteeing no telephone follow up was possible. Nothing was established as to their reason for move, timescales, position of their own property, mortgage situation or property requirements. As it happens, the applicant’s brief was that
46 ● September 2012 ● TheNegotiator
Do you really fi nd out what your caller wants?
he was ready, willing and able to buy within a very short timescale due to a job move to the area. He had no property to sell. He was likely to visit the area within the next three days to start viewing and probably to make a buying decision immediately. He would have welcomed another mortgage quote and would have been interested in being referred to the Lettings department in case he failed to fi nd somewhere to buy quickly enough. In short, this applicant was as good as they get, and yet no business resulted from this encounter. Could your staff have such shortcomings?
Granted, this was only a ‘Mystery Shopper’, but the agent did not know that! Imagine this person as a real applicant…
how would he have felt about the service received? Consider the context that he subsequently phoned other agents, as he surely would, and received better treatment more appropriate to his circumstances. Another agent might have engaged him in
a longer conversation and quickly discovered what a fantastic prospect he actually was. Simply by establishing a few key elements of information, it would become clear that he
We have noticed a reduction in sales activity since the end of May and I sense we are in for a challenging end to the year. Your thoughts on winning this battle please?
should receive VIP treatment. “How soon do you need to have moved by?”, “How are you getting on with your own property?”, “What sort of timescale are you working to?”, “How many people will be living in the property?” “When are you next in the area to view?” “What else have you seen so far?” These are open questions that would have painted an interesting picture. “Describe your ideal home to me…” off ers
the applicant the chance to wax lyrical about what is important to them in their new property and gives the negotiator an idea of which available properties may be most suitable. Sadly, the majority of these questions do not
appear as prompts on the computer screens used by negotiators as the method of applicant registration – hence agents end up with an unwieldy database of poorly vetted buyers and tenants – not knowing the wheat from the chaf – a dangerous scenario. An immediate match should be done to see
what is appropriate and viewings should be encouraged and arranged. Associated services such as mortgages, conveyancing or lettings could also be off ered. Details could be emailed immediately to
avoid the customer waiting – in this case an email never even arrived! This would also mean that properties on with that agent and a competitor or two would be received and potentially viewed through this agent fi rst. Finally, a follow up call to check the safe
receipt of those details and to check suitability and desired viewings would ensure a great start to the applicant’s interaction with the agent. This must increase the likelihood that he will pay a visit to the agent in question upon arriving in the area in the near future, prior to seeing the local competitors. In the case of the call detailed earlier in this
article, it is doubtful that the agent would have sold this applicant a property. In fact, the only subsequent dealings with the customer would probably be when he phoned in to be taking off the mailing list due to fi nding a property elsewhere. ●
www.thenegotiator.co.uk
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