Chris Watkin and Sally Lawson give their tips on how letting agents can showcase their potential and win more.
Winning new landlords is a key priority for letting agents. But how can they achieve this through marketing tactics? To stand out, agents must adopt various strategies, such as utilising social media and understanding their customers.
In our recent webinar, “Win More Landlords Through Your Agency's Brand,” experts Christopher Watkin, the UK’s number two business generation guru for letting agents, and Sally Lawson, founder of Agent Rainmaker, alongside Goodlord’s Director of Growth, Costas Frangeskou, shared insights on how letting agents can attract new landlords.
🖥️ Agents can watch the webinar here
🎧 Agents can listen to the webinar here
Find out how to win more landlords according to the experts:
- Building trust between landlords and letting agents
- Understanding a landlord's needs
- Utilise social media to connect with local landlords
- Specialise service to attract different landlords
Building trust between landlords and letting agents
Having a strong reputation is crucial for letting agents. Landlords need to trust and rely on a letting agent to manage their rental properties. Building trust and a strong brand will set agents apart from the competition.
As Christopher Watkin emphasised in our webinar, “Your brand and your marketing are designed to get people to trust you, and that is the magic. How do you get people to trust you as a letting agent?”
For landlords to trust a new letting agent, they first need to know and like them. Building a personal connection through marketing - whether via email or social media - can help establish this trust and enhance their reputation, ultimately helping agents win new landlords.
Agents should diversify their marketing and specifically social media content, to reach new landlords. Instead of focusing solely on property listings, include posts that resonate emotionally with landlords. Letting agents should diverse topics for marketing, which could range from lettings legislation to energy efficiency upgrades or community stories.
“Humans make decisions 19 out of 20 times with the emotional side of their brain first and back it up with logic,” Chris explains. “You could be the best agent, but at the end of the day, that’s not enough to make them use your agency.”
Building trust will boost your reputation and help you win new landlords.
Understanding a landlord's needs
Beyond building trust, understanding and addressing landlords' needs is vital. Sally Lawson highlights, “One of the things for getting more landlords on your books is starting to identify what the new landlord needs.”
While many agents are aware of the basic needs of landlords, offering additional services can set you apart from competitors.
For example, as Sally explains, “Agent Rainmaker got a lot of landlords who bought between 1997 and 2002 because that was the buy-to-let heyday. As their mortgages end, we started to offer a service called selling off the market, where a landlord with an occupied property sells to a landlord who wants to buy an occupied property.”
Understanding and meeting landlords' specific needs will help agents attract new clients and retain existing ones. It can act as a unique selling point for letting agents, which they can then use in their marketing to attract the landlords they want.
Utilise social media to connect with local landlords
Letting agents can find new landlords by engaging with their local communities. Whether in a small town or a larger city, social media offers a powerful platform to reach landlords who may not be accessible through traditional marketing.
As Chris Watkin advises, “The vast majority of landlords live locally. So to win new landlords, joining local Facebook groups can build your reputation.”
Once in these groups, agents should “post content that is of interest,” as Chris says in our webinar. This content could include insights on the rental market or local property trends. Chris also encourages using video as part of your marketing strategy, making agents more relatable and memorable to potential landlords.
Specialise your service to attract different landlords
To successfully attract new landlords, letting agents must understand the types of landlords they wish to target. Assuming all landlords have the same needs can limit opportunities to engage with diverse market segments.
Sally Lawson notes that agents “have to create different services for different landlords at different stages in their landlord journey.”
Agents should identify and tailor their services to meet the specific needs of the landlords they want to attract. For example, agents targeting small-town landlords should customise their offerings to suit the unique requirements of that community.
As Sally points out, letting agents should understand their audience, whether they’re “investors who want to buy, traditional landlords who always use letting agents, those looking to sell, retiring landlords, or let-only clients.”
By narrowing their focus and refining their messaging, letting agents can more effectively use social media and other marketing channels to attract the right landlords.
