How to Build Customer Loyalty

A real estate agent, salesperson’s job is complicated, especially if you want to do it well while leaving a good impression. To help you do that, here’s a guide on building customer loyalty in real estate.

Work on your communication skills

The first way to build customer loyalty in real estate is by working on your communication skills. There are two aspects to this. First, you must work on interacting with customers naturally and flexibly. That will help you build rapport and even help with your job, such as hosting an open house. Second is keeping in touch with your clients through texts and emails. Customers love being kept in the loop, especially when it comes to something as crucial as purchasing or selling a home. Of course, you must strike a balance between not informing them enough and sharing too much detail.

Always do homeowner checkups

A homeowner’s checkup may seem like a daunting term, but it is simply a necessary step, and incorporating it in your approach to clients will help grow your career as a Realtor. It simply means taking the time to meet with your clients, preferably in a less official setting, and both helping them with their goals as well as helping them get acquainted with the process of buying a home and moving. You can look at the checkup as the first step of sorting out their understanding of what they need to do. At the same time, you can gauge the client in question and check for any red flags. After all, not every client is easy to work with.

Listen to and follow their wishes

You are the one who will be helping them find ideal buyers or an ideal home. To build customer loyalty in real estate, you must listen to their desires. Does this mean doing the more technical part of your job, such as offering advice on legal matters, is not as important? Of course, it is! But if you are constantly trying to talk them into viewing a home that’s nothing like what they’re looking for, they will naturally feel reluctant to continue working with you.

Make it obvious they can rely on you

A good real estate agent can leverage their experience and connections to help their client with many tasks. For example, you can help with securing moving services and any kind of assistance related to their move. You will likely get to know moving companies and other services in your area and whether they can be relied on. That is something a person is unlikely to look into in their everyday life, and, as such, vetting moving companies and looking for relevant references is hard, exhausting work. If you can help them and let them skip that step, they will naturally feel more inclined to continue working with you. And even recommend your services to their friends, family, and acquaintances! 

Be forthright from the start

Some may think that to build customer loyalty in real estate. You need to make grand promises and predictions to help dazzle your clients. That is wrong since this simply means ratcheting their expectations and inevitably letting them down. Instead, even if it stings a little at the start, it’s better to help them stay realistic. Do you know that the asking price they cited for their home is too high? Tell them that. Gently, of course. And follow that up by providing some advice on how they could increase the selling price cheaply. Have they set an unrealistic budget while listing requirements that would make a home extremely costly? The same replies, but this time you can stir them to properties that only require minor renovations and maybe a minor remodel or two to fit their criteria.

Show your appreciation

Small gestures can often go a long way towards making someone feel better, predisposed to you. That is why keeping track of holidays, significant dates, and your clients’ information pays off. An unexpected birthday card, or even a nice text on the day, can make someone’s day and help improve your image. The same applies when working with clients during holidays. You do not need to make any overly grand gestures. But, a complimentary basket of cookies just before Christmas to celebrate a home purchase is a touching gesture that will make the day more memorable for your clients.

Advise them on how to avoid mistakes and homebuyer’s regret

One essential problem buyers run into, which you should do your best to prevent, is homebuyers’ regret. In simple terms, regret tends to pop up when a person buys a perfect home but is not a good fit for them. That can happen for a considerable variety of reasons. The layout could be impractical. They could end up spending more of their budget than planned and face financial difficulties. Or they may even fall for the pitfall of fixer-upper homes and realize that the ‘cheap’ property comes with a hefty renovation bill before it will be usable. Whatever the case, you should make it your priority to give quality advice that prevents any regrets.

Build up a stellar reputation among clients

Reputation matters a whole lot in the real estate industry. That is why the final way to build customer loyalty in real estate is through improving it! We already mentioned that you could work to get recommendations from your clients. And this will become one of the cornerstones of your reputation growth. By following our other advice, you should be able to leave an excellent impression on your clients. In turn, they will spread these stories and paint a good image of you ahead of time. Couple this with efforts to manage your business well, such as knowing how to handle your taxes and other tasks, and you can build yourself up as one of the best realtors to work with.

Final comment

Knowing how to build customer loyalty in real estate will do wonders for your career. Of course, keep in mind that some customers are impossible to work with. Their expectations will always be too high, or they might refuse to acknowledge your advice and blame the problems on you. All you can do is try to avoid working with them when possible. That is why interviews and homeowner checkups are so important.