Doug Stucky

Engaging customers is far more that just spouting words. Engagement is all the arts of listening, conversation, observing, managing expectations, and and assessing the situation all rolled into one.

You may not realize it but you are setting expectations before you even hear from a potential client. The company you are associated with, the look and feel of your advertising, your web site, your relationship with previous clients and sign you put in front of a property all start setting expectations. By the time a new client has called you they have probably been engaged by you at least three times. This means every business decision you make should be based on how it engages the customer. Will it be positive or perceived as negative?

One of my pet peeves is showing up to an appointment on time (usually a few minutes early) and then having to sit and wait for that person for another 10 minutes past our scheduled time. I made the effort and I expect them to as well. Yet I see realtors do this all the time. Who is more important here, the customer or you? If the customer has to wait too long the engagement will be off, permanently.

Cell phones also kill engagement. When your cell phone goes off in a meeting it interrupts engagement and prioritizes importance. If you take the call, the client is now at least second on the list. If you look at it and deem it not worthy of taking right now, it says this one was not more important than you are, but the next call might be. Turn the phone OFF for the meeting.

One great way to engage is come prepared. Know the neighbor they live in or in they are from out of town, know something about the state they are coming from. Have useful information at the ready, area facts, schools, income, population, know what homes have sold for in their area in the past. Come ready to engage.

This may seem like common sense, but as a good friend of mine told me “common sense, isn’t that common”.

Malcom Gladwell in his new book “Outliers: The Story of Success” ( Publisher: Little, Brown and Company, 2008) talks of Practical Knowledge. Gladwell points out that Practical Knowledge is the ability to listen,observe, and assess the situation and react accordingly. I really like the is term Practical Knowledge which is different from Analytical Knowledge. Analytical Knowledge is brain smarts, you know the ability to divide irrational numbers without paper or calculator, understand physics and so on. The point is that engaging customers requires Practical Knowledge. You must be able to listen as well as talk, see as well as be shown, lead as well as follow. Customers want the relationship to be successful, that is why they hired you, so they are willing to provide you with all the information you need to find them a perfect home or the perfect buyer for their home if you are able to engage them enough to get the information.

On your next appointment don't think about what you are going to say, think about how your are going to engage.

COOL, WEIRD, FUN, FRIENDLY, CARING, PASSIONATE, INNOVATIVE, RESPONSIVE, HUMOROUS, TRUSTWORTHY, GREEN?

What’s your Brand Personality?

Your brand personality is what makes you unique. It can be funny or just fun, innovative, creative or weird. Perhaps it’s responsive, caring or trustworthy. Personalities are important because it is how consumers perceive you and what makes you memorable. Too strong and you scare consumers away. Too weak, they ignore you. Too weird, they avoid you. But get to the sweet spot of cool, fun or innovative and they flock to you.

Developing and maintaining an intreguing brand personality takes careful planning and management. Each experience consumers have with your brand either reinforces or alters their perception.

For decades businesses have started with the premiss of getting the products and services developed and working on the brand as they go. A better approach is focus on the brand first. Who are we? What do we stand for? What makes us unique? What is our brand personality? Answer these questions and you can position your brand to consistently engage your target customers.