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One of Australia’s leading agents has revealed how hiring specialist database managers and promoting rival properties have boosted his profitability.
Hockingstuart Bentleigh director Nick Renna, who finished 16th on last year’s Top 100 Agents ranking, said strict systems are responsible for his success.
Mr Renna told Real Estate Business that one vital part of effective database management is to keep it away from personal assistants.
“When you take on a PA, the last job they want to be doing is databasing, because it’s not an exciting chore,” he said.
“I’ve found when I’ve had PAs trying to do my day-to-day admin work and also my databasing, it hasn’t worked, because the databasing gets put on the backburner and your database doesn’t get serviced properly.”
Mr Renna said database managers can be full-time or part-time employees, depending on the size of the customer list, and can also be shared between multiple agents.
They should oversee a strict system of regular client communication, which might include weekly sales results, monthly newsletters, quarterly phone calls and sale anniversaries, he added.
Mr Renna said another important part of database management is to crunch the numbers to find the value of each referral category so agents know where to focus their efforts.
Analysis might reveal, for example, that a smaller network of developers is delivering more revenue per contact than a larger network of conveyancers.
Mr Renna told Real Estate Business that he isn’t afraid to promote rival properties in order to add value to the clients on his database.
“If people have a house to sell but are also looking to buy, I spend four or five hours every week trying to find homes for them. I’ll even submit competitors’ properties to them,” he said.
“That’s a really good way of securing business. When they’re getting emails from me and it’s a competitor’s property, they think that’s pretty cool.”
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