HOW TO: Prepare a Property For Marketing That Generates 12 Viewings in 2.5 Days
There are only 2 ways to launch a property to the market
- Quickly
- Properly
Only one of those ways will net the best results!
I find it pretty shocking that 3% of properties are advertising with NO pictures. That’s both crazy and stupid.
If your agent suggests rushing your property onto the portals with no pics, kick them out the door immediately and find another one.
At the other end of the scale, a house I recently launched to market (and received 12 viewing requests in the first 2.5 days of marketing) took 3 weeks to prepare for market launch…
Fail to prepare, prepare to fail!
I’m going to break down the exact steps we took.
So step 1 was The Appraisal
The client called me because I was recommended to them. I had sold his friends house for more than any other agent had suggested he would achieve so he wanted a bit that!
Whilst looking around, there were a few things I noticed that, if done, would really help the marketing, viewings and so ultimately the sale price. It was mainly the garden fencing and the driveway so they took my advice and took 2 weeks replacing fencing and re-doing the drive.
Step 2 was the Photography & Videography
This can’t be rushed. My belief is that an estate agent should never pick up a camera! Estate agents are professional negotiators and they should employ the services of a professional photographer (and videographer) to do what they do best. The photographer I use is VERY in demand so we had to wait 4 days until he could visit. Then he spent a day at the house and then 3 days editing.
Step 3 was Preparing The Marketing Details
This includes:
- Doing the Write Up (keeping it punchy not an essay)
- Uploading the video to YouTube (and optimising it for high traffic search terms)
- Choosing which pictures we are going to launch with (we don’t use them all)
- Which of those pictures are we going to use as ‘the money shot’ (the shot that is most likely to increase the ‘click through rate’ which results in more enquiries which results in more viewings which results in more offers which results in a higher sale price)
Step 4 was Setting The Marketing Price
I always do this just before market launch as during the 3 weeks it took to get the house ready for marketing, the competition (what else is available for sale locally) may have changed.
We decided on a guide price of £875,000
Step 5 was The Launch
Always a Wednesday as that’s when people are most likely browsing (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday) to book viewings for the weekend.
I personally like Sunday viewing days as the house I am selling (generally) is the only house people will be viewing on a Sunday (as most agents are closed on Sundays) as it gets more of the viewers attention and brain space vs Saturdays when they could be rushing around ⅘ houses.
The results…
By Thursday evening, we had 12 back-to-back viewings booked (8 for the Sunday, 4 for the following Saturday).
Moral of the story… do it properly 👌
