Power Farm
It’s time you learn how to Power Farm from Bruce Gardner, the founder of Mastery, Inc. He says this is a way you can dominate in a local market in this digital age, and our stats show top producers are spending up to half their week focused on prospecting and finding new business. Meeting potential clients they’ve never crossed paths with before is leading to them closing more deals
“We are in the reputation economy,” says Gardner. Customers care about reviews. They want to know what your value proposition is.
Know the Neighborhood
You must become a neighborhood expert. Gardner advises agents that buyers and seller want agents who have local knowledge.
The 7 Core Elements of Power Farming:
- Do Market Research and Select your Farm.
- Acquire Market and Community Knowledge
- Create a Hyperlocal Market Report
- Create a Dedicated Hyperlocal Website and your other Web Assets
- Create a Multi-layer Marketing Campaign
- Implement Reverse-Marketing for Leads
- Implement “Immersion” Prospecting for Leads
Selecting Your Farm
Look at metrics that show neighborhood trends. You have to be able to interpret the trends – turnover rate (what percentage of the homes are selling in a year – the higher the number, the better), absorption rate (the percentage of available inventory that sells in a month), average sold price, average days on market, and months of inventory.
Gardner says,”look for a place with more than 100 sales, with at least a 6% turnover rate, 25% absorption rate.”
Muti-layer Marketing Campaign
Gardner advises to think outside of the box and go deep when creating buzz about what you do. Blog about neighborhoods. Work them to find out interesting stats or local hot spots.
Use interesting themes in postcards to market yourself to a particular area. This is also a great way to cross promote with local businesses. Go talk to local businesses to create those partnerships, and in the process, get yourself immersed in the community. You may learn who is interested in selling, creating a new lead. You will find out before homes hit the MLS. This neighborhood insider info will make you a more valuable agent.
Use social media to help integrate yourself into the community. Talk about neighborhood events or topics interesting to residents.
Always have a follow up plan. Keep a database of the contacts you make. Send weekly emails about the neighborhood. Make yourself the neighborhood expert.
Implement Reverse-Marketing for Leads
Research shows most homeowners who choose to sell, have lived in their home for at least a decade. When choosing to upgrade, they only go about 15 miles from their current home. They also tend to move up 50% in price when moving into a new home. Using this research as an example of who to target for a lead, looks like this. If you’re selling someone’s home for $400,000, search neighborhoods within a 15 mile radius that have homeowners living in homes that range in cost from $250,000 – $300,000. They would need to be homeowners who have been in their home for at least the past decade.
Gardner says a great way for a listing agent to get this business is to pitch the seller by saying, “we target the most likely potential buyers near your neighborhood to get fast results.”
Implement Immersion Prospecting
You must knock on doors. “There’s no better way to learn a neighborhood and generate leads,” adds Gardner.
Hand them a fact sheet you’ve drafted about the going rates of homes in the neighborhood. Ask them if they would consider moving if they could sell their home for the right price. Follow up by finding out where they would move to. Tell them you’ll do the research on that particular neighborhood and get back with them.
Gardner reminds everyone don’t forget to blog about the best properties you’ve seen that are “just listed”.
Don’t shy away from community meetings. Make sure the area knows who you are, and how you can help them.
What To Do
Stop selling homes in neighborhoods you don’t really know anything about. Become the expert of a neighborhood, and then pay attention to how your interactions with people become more genuine, leading you to more clients. The more you talk to people who live there, the more you’ll understand how to best move real estate in that area.
(To learn more from top agents. You can listen to them answer your questions in our podcast section of ProspectingToday.com.)
