Marketing Coordinators

Welcome to the Leading Lane podcast for Real Estate Pros by Real Estate Pros with your hosts, Ashley Frederick and Steven Burch. If you're looking for an honest, authentic and raw perspective, you found it. Welcome back and thank you for. Hopefully you listened to our last episode. We were talking about first hires and employees and so. So naturally I think it's great to share about. Probably one of the best decisions for at least for my company that we did and being able to help us grow and be able to take over market share is hire a marketing coordinator in our market. At the time, everybody was still taking and there's still people doing it, taking photos with, you know, their iPhone or whatever else. And you can see them in the mirror. They have the toilet seat up. Like there's one photo, the dog's in there. Sometimes we have agents that, you know, are just driving by the house. Don't even get out of the house and take the picture from their, their window and you can see their side mirror, you know. So anyways, we. What I really wanted to do, partially because I have a little bit of a control issue. I'm getting much better at you. Yeah, high expectations, control issues, you know, a lot of these different things. Nobody else has those, I'm sure. Never. I don't have any of those. So what we were doing, like, we decided to hire a photographer and it was an outside photographer and we were paid for all the photography for all of our listings. It's included. We did it for every single one of our listings. That was part of our investment into the listings on the marketing. At the end of the year when we're going over all of our expenses, I saw the amount that we were spending on said photographer and I was like, I did the math and I was like, hire somebody. Like. So then we really started diving in. Like, not only, you know, could we get rid of the photographer, we were outsourcing, you know, the social media. We were outsourcing a lot of the stuff on the website. We were having to do all the events and everything ourselves. All of our, you know, like all of these other things that we can pull together, reduce those expenses. Hire a full time employee versus an independent contractor. We went to a W2 full time and now we are able to provide the photography. The matterport she does absolutely, like gets the listing package together. Like, it's absolutely insane. So in the first portion of it, it was, yes, it was going to reduce our cost and then we were getting more value of it. But what really was happening when we started really, truly recruiting. We were able to. This was like my number one, you know, card that I would throw on the table that, hey, we have a marketing coordinator that is going to be able to do all of this for you. You no longer have to coordinate. You don't have to do anything or in, nor do you have to pay for it. Right. It's included. So we were able to recognize that by doing that, yes, it's a support position, but we were able to remove the, I call them tedious tasks away from agents. I mean like how long does a person truly, you know, take to upload the photos to the MLS and go through them, organize them, you know, and then blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all these different things. So the goal then and our focus changed when in that growth step there was what other things can we do and provide to our agents? A lot like your transaction coordinator. What else can we do to remove those tedious tasks to get them from out behind, behind from their computer? They're not experts in photography or Photoshop or anything else. So what can we do to help them to get in front of more people in less time and you know, with screen time. And that was a huge eye opener for us and you know, saved us money. And I now we have Skye, which is our director of marketing and she is on point, right? Like she handles anything and everything with marketing. Anything that events above and beyond where we even started with this position. And she has grown, she's handling our leads, I mean like just absolutely everything. And it's great to be able to push that now to one said department instead of us trying to half ass everything and have, you know, piecemeal everything out there. It was a huge game changer. And the other part of it too. And I always say this is that marketing. Like when you get a listing, when you market that listing, you're truly not marketing that listing for that seller that you're putting a sign in their yard. You're marketing that for that next seller that is looking to sell their house. So when they look at our site and our marketing materials, ours is consistent across the board because we have the same photographer. And when you look at other companies, they're hiring third parties and different, different photographers, not having everything same consistent across the board. So this helped us keep that consistency level there, provide value to our agents and then being able to make sure that we have the piece that the sellers are able to see and get it done quicker and faster than pretty much any other third party is able to do. And it's within our branding guidelines. So love our director of marketing. She's absolutely phenomenal. And you know, being able to. Being able to have another person there on, you know, like, to support Kim and to support everybody else is. I just can't even tell you, like, I don't even know what we would do without her. So it's fantastic. Steven, what would you say, like, how did your agents react to that when you made that change? What. I mean, I'm sure whenever there's change, there's a little bit of kickback, but what was the, you know, first process as far as what your agents thought, felt and then how has that come, you know, how. Present day? Yeah. So I, I think that first, like, they had a, A loyalty to the photographer that we've been working with for some time. And so they were a little upset that we were ending that relationship. And so I just had to reassure him that we're not ending the relationship. We still will use this person and I mean, we still hire him for events and everything else, but for the actual inter inside, you know, I had to really show them the value and the benefit. And it was almost like I had to create a whole pitch deck, if you will, that to be able to say, like, hey, this is what's coming. These are the changes, but this is your benefit. Right? Like, and now they were able to, you know, it lessened the, the blow of the change. And you know, there for a while, this guy had a. She had a death in the family, unfortunately. And. And so she was out for a couple weeks and we contracted out to another third party. And I think almost every single person that got a listing while Skye was away came back and was like, no, that photographer was nice. We like her. However, comma, it's not Skye and we love Skye. And so I think it actually her being able to be away and not easily accessible changed and increased the level of appreciation that agents had because I think they, they didn't like the change and then, you know, they kind of maybe got a little bit spoiled and forgot what it was like not having somebody and knowing our, the way our style and how we work. Um, so, yeah, it was definitely a little bit of a change. But ultimately, again, I think it all goes back to in leadership, being open and honest and showing the true reason of why you're making that decision. And then you get the buy in from your agents from there. So, yeah, it wasn't that terrible. We, we made it through there. But yeah, I mean, and for those that don't Know, Skye, she's like this little pint size of a human, and her personality is. Is fantastic, but I think even more so. What's cool is, obviously she does your listing stuff, but I love, too, that when you guys are at conferences or whatnot, she really tries to get you guys in the moment, enjoying those types of things, too, which I think people forget sometimes when they're at conferences. Like, I even told Skye the last time I was there, I was like, can you be our photographer for my office as well when we're at these conferences? Because I forget. So it's great that she, you know, thinks outside the box for those types of things. I think it goes like. Go ahead. I'm sorry. Nope, go ahead. Well, I was going to just reiterate, like, you were talking about Jessica and being able to watch her growth. Like, Skye, she'll tell you, right? And we joke about it all the time. Like, Skye's not a people person. She doesn't like people. She's not a social person. She's more an introvert. So this position is fantastic because she doesn't have to talk to a lot of people. So being able to see her growth from when she first started, I approached her, one of our credit unions was closing down in our area, and so I messenger, I was like, hey, I know that you like photography as a hobby. Do you want to make it a career? And she was like, I don't like people. I don't want to do real estate. And so being able to see, you know, three, four years ago, or however long it's been that she joined our company and where she is now. I mean, we had a meeting yesterday with somebody in our office, and we were trying to measure out 7ft, like, weird things that we were doing, and she's literally laying on the floor and trying to measure out 7ft. Like, trying to figure she's 5 foot. 2, Like, 5.2 plus,. But. But, yeah. So, like, I mean, just being able to see her come out of that shell and feel comfortable in that. And she get a drone license, too. Yeah. Like, she has a pilot's license. Like, we. We paid for her to go, like, actually get licensed. And I was like, I don't know what that entails. She did all the work, and she's like, I'm a. I have a license. I'm a pilot license now. Like, what? I didn't know that that's what you had to do. So. And again, that's growing. Growing and investing in your people. Like, that's what you have to do they want to grow, we want to grow. So we're now able to not only add the photography matterport, now we have the drone that we're able to offer as well. So it's continuing to level up. Once you master something, what were you going to say about your office? So we're not quite at the stage of hiring a market manager. I think sometimes when you get to these rural areas it makes things interesting as well. I think it's definitely something we could look at in the future. So right now we do actually work through, I think three different photographers, slash, slash videographers. Mine actually comes from like 45 minutes away. That tells you how slim this is of pickings. I think we're one of the few offices where almost all of ours are, you know, professional pictures. It's one of my, you know, pitches and my listing appointments because I don't honestly don't think that other offices use professional photographers. There might be one and then they might just like pick and choose which listings, which I don't think is fair. I think that. Go ahead. I think they pick and choose based off of like the, the sales price. Yes. I think that's shitty. No matter if it's a $10,000 house or a 10 million. Correct. Right. So that's like one of my biggest additional pet peeves is it doesn't matter. The client, like all clients should be treated the same. Right. Whether it's an eighty thousand dollar house, a hundred thousand dollar house or a million dollar house. Every single one of my clients gets the same treatment. They get the same type of photography. Sure. Will they turn out the same? Not necessarily. But they are still having their house showcased way better phone can do. And I started doing professional pictures on my own. You know, like as far as hiring it out, I think maybe four, almost four years ago. And let me tell you, people pick up on that. When people are looking at homes, you know, they're always like your homes always look the nicest and right when they come to sell their home like three or four years later, that's what they're going to remember. So you know, I've, I've pushed that with other agents in the office. I think majority of them have swapped over to using a photographer and it's just like night and day. You know, I just had this conversation with a seller yesterday about, you know, that we'd schedule professional photography and a lot of it has to do with, you know, Covid was a really big time for people to move without ever seeing the property. So virtually right. The pictures needed to look dang good as far as the videos in order to even to get them to consider. So. So I think that that set our office way ahead in Covid periods was because our pictures looked so great. Again, you have someone that's looking to move, you know, thousands of miles across the country and they're trying to make a decision off of a distorted cell phone picture with a dog laying in the middle of the living room. Like I. It just blows my mind. And I. Right. I think it's a disservice to our profession as well. So I'm a pretty big stickler for pictures. So currently in our office, the agents are responsible for them. And you know, it is the same thing, right? You kind of like get to know. I think for me, like, right, my photographer knows what to expect was the Box Brownie app. So Imran, I think it was the one that put me onto that at some point in time. And for those of you that don't know, Box Brownie is this really cool app that helps you. You do all kinds of things. So at the end of the day, like, remember, we can't like remove trees or make the picture look, you know, different than what's reality. But in central Wisconsin, we have a lot of cloudy days and I hate like a front picture that's cloudy and gloomy. So photographer will take the front picture and then I submit it to Box Brownie and I get to pick what Skye I want. So it's, you know, blue skies, you know, Skye with a couple clouds, a little bit of sun. And again, that front picture looks 10 times better. And that a lot of times I'll show the sellers, like the original picture and then the edited picture of the background and they're like, oh my gosh, it looks amazing. So there's that. And then sometimes, right, you get some like there's just like boxes in a corner that they just couldn't move or whatnot. Same thing. You can like draw a little circle. The Box Brownie will remove it for you. They do floor plans. One thing I found really helpful during that Covid timeframe too is vacant houses. And you can virtually stage. You can pick the theme. And then obviously you just have to make sure that it, you know, you state that it's virtually, you know, depending on how many pictures I have to edit or whatnot. I mean, I'll edit all my outside pictures, you know, or if a lighting was just off, but I mean, maybe maybe $50 if it's a really, you know, extensive repairs, you know, or changes that need to be made, or a lot of outside pictures. Maybe a hundred dollars, but a hundred dollars for your again like this, you're, you're literally selling yourself right. As an agent when you're presenting these. So to spend that extra hundred dollars to make sure that your clients pictures look the best, but then also that people know that your pictures look fantastic. Well, well worth the money spent. Absolutely. I think it's a huge investment like and like it's a differential for, for you to be able to, I mean if you're going to try to win a listing and you know they're, they're interviewing multiple other agents and you're able to show them consistent pieces that this is how you are different, how you stand out. Because the more that you stand out, in my opinion as their listing agent means the more that they're listing their home is going to stand out. Which you know, that is higher, higher sales price, quicker, you know, sales time on you know, days on market. So I think that you know, yes, there is a little bit of investment to do it and they even haven't run specials and everything. Like I think you can do a photo for like less than a dollar on when you first sign up. Like don't quote me on that. I know that $1.60 or something. Yeah, like it's like stupidly, ridiculously cheap investment to be able to do it. But it's just something different that does not cost you a lot of money that you don't have to go out there and do anything absolutely insane. And you know, for anybody that's listening, what I would really recommend, like if you don't are not doing professional photography yet or Matterport or these other different types of media, start with something like box Brownie. Start something small, see what the difference, see what the interaction is like and what your engagement is like. Throw it on social and see, you know, vote A or B type of thing. Just play around with a little bit so that you know, that you know you're getting the confidence and you're, you're finding that value proposition for yourself to be able to clearly articulate to the other people. Well and I think even like another avenue would be, you know, I understand like starting out, you know, funds are tight. So I think if you have like a local technical school or something like that, like reach out, like see if they have a photography program and you know, again if someone's trying to learn, it'd be a great option for you to, you Know, more or less just do a trade of like, hey, here's like a property. Can you photograph, can you photograph it for me? It might not even cost you anything, right? But it could be that you help them, they help you, and you establish, you know, a role down the, down the road. But I think that you can get creative about it. But it really, it goes back to, you have to spend money to make money. And I do really feel like it's, you know, part of our job to make sure that our listings are shining when they're, when they're online and that we're doing those extra little things. Because that's what I would want, right? If I were selling my house, I'd want to know that my agent was taking those little extra steps to, you know, make it stand out in what, you know, could be a seller's market, buyer's market, whatever. I think that's the other thing that I noticed too was during COVID people that used to do professional photography stopped doing professional photography because the listing was going to sell regardless. And so I remember I was on a call with someone, a different agent, and he was referring someone, you know, up here, and I mentioned that I always do professional photography. And he even said, yeah, I got a little lazy during COVID It was going to sell anyway, so why, why waste the time on professional photography? And it irked me so bad because, one, I guarantee you, you probably would have got a better list or list to sale price ratio if you would have done that. Professional pictures, because it could have brought in different buyers. Right? Like, right when the market does change and things aren't flying off the shelf and sellers start to research you and they see, you know, that there are these not so good pictures, just two or three now, you know, maybe you don't stand a chance in that listing presentation because you weren't always doing it. Right? Right. And I mean, I think that, like, that is Rule 101 in real estate. It's consistency. So whatever you start, you know, be consistent with it, master it, and then you can add on to it. Never take away, you can always pivot, right? Like, but don't take away the different value ads that you're bringing to the table. Um, I mean, that's what everybody else is doing. So stand out amongst the crowd. And I, I guarantee you if you are consistent and persistent with it, people are going to start seeing and recognize and at the end of the day, you know that you have served your clients well and that you're not making choices based off of sales price or the way that the market is if it's hot or not. You have to make sure that you, as you know your value proper are constantly doing it. You wouldn't want your doctor like your. Brand, I mean, right, right. Like your brand, like you don't want your, your brand shouldn't be changing because the market's slower, because the market's fast. Your brand and how you treat people should be steadfast. And I think that when you, you know, step back and look at like a three or five year period like that return on investment, I can guarantee you will be there by the amount of continued business that you get. The. You know, a lot of times it comes up in my reviews that people post about, you know, how great the photography was and how they did a great job. And my favorite is when the sellers get their pictures back and then they're like, I mean, do I really want to move? This house looks like somebody else's house. And that's one of my favorite things is just because it's so fun to put that, you know, in a different light for them. One closing gift I like to do too is that if it's somebody that has been in that, in the house for a really long time or it was like super personal for them and their family is, you know, just do a little book, right? Like a, a little book of the pictures that you took. Add in you know, 10 pictures. Thank you for your business, you know, hope all is well in your next chapter and I'll tell you like those little things and how people, so many people ask for the pictures afterwards. So I like to make little books for them and what a keepsake for them. But again like right. You'll top of mind for sure. Well and think of like if that ends up on their coffee table and you know, at their new house and then other people are seeing it picking up like you're, they're legit marketing for you now. Like that's going to be a conversation piece like on their coffee table and they are going to promote you. So yes, stand out, be different. It's, it's okay to not do what everybody else is doing. Think outside of the box and tenfold. That's going to come back to you. So awesome. Cool. Well, thank you everybody for listening today. Please go like subscribe and tune into the next episode. It's going to be great. Cool. If you've enjoyed today's episode, please like subscribe and share with others. Stay connected for more genuine insights and strategies to boost your real estate career on Facebook or check out our website. We'll see you next time.