Rory Black from Dataloft recently caught up with Dataloft Inform subscriber Chris Poulton from Martin & Co Sunderland. In a wide-ranging conversation, Chris and Rory compare notes on the importance of using property market insight to win new business, nurture long term relationships and stand out in marketing.

Why does really knowing the market make you stand out?

The challenge for all businesses is to find a point of difference with their marketing. In the estate agency sector, building trust is vital. Having local market insights and detailed market knowledge at your fingertips helps to achieve this. And data can also be very creative.

Getting creative with data

“The ultimate example (of being creative with data) is in this stat about Sunderland (see panel, right). Let’s imagine you get three mail shots. Mail shot one is generic, bland, basic. You get your next one saying ‘we need more properties’ and, so what! And then you get one through saying that values have gone up £68,000 since the turn of the century. Which one do you think will stick out more?”.

Finding a stat to ‘create pressure’ or stimulate debate and interest is powerful and sophisticated. It resonates with people and can prompt them to consider whether they should be thinking about a move. And, because it’s a fact from a creditable source like the Land Registry, for example, it can be trusted.

“Averages are great for awareness. We’ll send out the Dataloft Inform market reports whenever anyone asks us for a valuation, which gives us credibility and instantly highlights that we know more than they do.”

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“I did this post on LinkedIn (above, showing the high value achieved in Sunderland of £690k) and it created so much interest because most people think that properties are so cheap. It played both ends of the market from people living in high end properties to the lowest value homes. It was something different, local and interesting to people rather than a circle showing that ‘we’ve sold more houses than everybody else.”

— Chris Poulton, Martin & Co Sunderland

And using property market insight as part of your marketing also allows you to be targeted, sending the right message to the right audience.

“I don’t want to be sending out a mailshot to somebody in South Shields which has got national data or Sunderland data … the more specific I can get the better. It's about being relevant and adding value to somebody’s day. You get bored on Facebook and LinkedIn when estate agents just use free valuations … you get a mental blocker when you see the same posts up there. I almost hope our competitors keep doing this as it helps us stand out even more!”

Paint a rich picture with property market data

Getting the interest of vendors, landlords and developers with creative and relevant marketing is step one. Step two is maintaining their interest and nurturing those relationships. Sharing an in-depth knowledge of the market will empower your customers to make informed decisions and create a deep level of trust and value.

“What I try to do is tell a story. Data for me needs context and one thing in isolation tells them what you want them to know but it doesn’t give the whole picture. As an example, you look at an investor who is wanting to flip a property and the average property price in Sunderland is £113,000. The thing with averages is that there is always something above and something below … but very rarely do we buy the average. Homeowners buy the expensive ones and investors buy the cheaper ones and do them up. For me it’s about looking at the range (of prices) and that’s where your data really gets me into.

If you can identify an area where the average property is £80,000, but the top end property is £140,000 and the bottom is £67,000 or whatever it might be, you can start to paint a picture for a homeowner. If you pay £120,000, you’ll get the best property in the street or equally you can say to an investor that on average you would pay £80,000 but the upside of your potential is £120,000, and you can get them for as cheap as £57,000, so you can add value.

So, for me it’s about taking that initial bit of data that builds the awareness and using it to create consideration and for them to come back and say that when I’m buying a house, I need this person because he’s the only one that can tell me this”.