Postioning Your Commercial Real Estate Brokerage for Results

In commercial real estate brokerage, it is wise to understand the strengths and weaknesses of your business and its position relative to the competition in the local area. In simple terms you have to stand out in some way or form as a top agent working in a brokerage of choice.

(N.B. these ideas are also sent out to regularly to our friends in Commercial Real Estate Online Snapshot to help amplify brokerage results…. Get your access here)

Without those points of difference and that position, it can be very difficult to attract the right levels of new business and convert more commissions over time.

Its Strategic

So the positioning process is a strategy and it should be a big part of your annual planning process in commercial property. It’s essential to get the facts about your business and what is happening around you by comparison.

How can you improve your real estate business if you don’t know its position in the local area? Your real estate ‘strengths’ have to be there as a support in your marketing and client contact processes.

Key Questions?

Consider these questions:

• Who are your competitors in the town or city that you cover?
• Where are they located when compared to your broker location?
• How do you compare from a real estate services and coverage perspective?
• Why should someone do business with you now or in the future?
• What is your core business type when you look at listings and location?
• Why would someone come back to you and give you more real estate business?

You can see that these questions drive some very specific answers. They make you consider where you are today and what you have been doing as a broker or agent locally.

The Facts?

Let’s face the facts here, there is no point in being ‘ordinary’ in our industry; there are just too many other competing brokers and agents around. If you want to be ‘good’ in the eyes of the client or the customers out there, then some real ‘positioning’ is required.

Here are some ideas to help with this process:

1. SERVICES: Given the property services that you can provide, what are the most professional from a client perspective? Consider specialised services that take the real estate business to a new level such as tenant mix strategies, resolving vacancy problems, improving property values over time, or resolving lease weaknesses in an asset. Take your services and shape them into the ‘value statement’ that applies to the clients that you serve.
2. PEOPLE: Some of the people in your real estate team will have real skills that can be applied at a higher level to the properties locally. Consider your mixing and matching of property services across sales, leasing, and property management. Use the fuller skills of the team.
3. GEOGRAPHICAL AND PROPERTY FOCUS: You cannot be the ‘expert’ across all property groups locally; it’s just too hard to know everything at a reasonable level. To really drive some new business opportunities, select the property types and the locations that will give you a solid feed of new listings and clients over time.

These 3 simple strategies will help you move to the next level of real estate opportunity, and position yourself as the expert in commercial property that the local property market and your client base really requires.

Your Choices?

Make the right ‘positioning’ choices and drive some personal marketing accordingly. Don’t be ordinary in what you do and say in client contact and direct marketing. Show the real estate world in your town or city that you are the right person that is needed to drive through the client’s property challenge in a timely and direct way.