Your reputation is your most powerful marketing tool. But even if your vendor would recommend you, their friends may not currently be selling or even live in the same locality as you – meaning that good, qualitative information about your service is being lost.
“77% of vendors would recommend their agent to a friend, yet only 20% of new business comes through referral” – The Property Academy, 2012
Clearly, there is a lot of potential for growth if you were able to capture the effects of your client’s recommendation, but testimonial pages on a website are akin to paid advertising: consumers don’t trust that the views represented provide an unbiased assessment of your service.
The most commonly quoted statistic in marketing is that 78% of consumers would trust recommendation from a friend while only 14% trust advertising but, as we have already seen, the effects of recommendation are diluted due to time and location constraints.
So what are the options?
"After peer recommendation, consumers trust consumer opinions online ahead of a broad list of paid advertising channels"– Nielson Global Consumer Survey 2009
It’s no surprise, given the explosion of reviews on the internet. TripAdvisor, RatedPeople, Amazon... the list is endless. It’s clear that consumers want information and businesses are benefitting by monetising their reputation through independent feedback.
Despite the fear of negative reviews, many forget that negative experiences will be talked about behind closed doors – a forum where you have no control. In addition, the proliferation of reviews sites has made consumers very savvy in terms of spotting comments that are out of sync with the consensus. Lastly, no one achieves 100% service satisfaction, and showing how you respond to and manage issues in a positive way can actually win you customers.
So independent reviews are the way forward, but consumers want information they can trust and as a business you will want to ensure that the platform you use is a credible one.
Here at MeetMyAgent we have built a reputation of being a provider of good information and advice having been regularly quoted as an expert source on property matters by BBC, Guardian, Telegraph, Independent, Daily Mail and the Express to name a few (see www.meetmyagent.co.uk/pressroom).
Our advice blogs have won industry acclaim and are fed into Property Tribes, the busiest property forum in the UK with an estimated 300,000 visitors per month. It’s only natural that a consumer is looking for property advice will look for an estate agent once they are ready to put their property on the market, and MeetMyAgent provides a trustworthy, independent platform where your clients can review and recommend your services.
Agents using MeetMyAgent are seeing real results through direct leads provided via our website and by using us as a reference point on valuations, so if you are looking for a way to monetise your reputation and grow your business then join us today!
To speak to a representative and find out more, fill in the short form at
Comments