How busy are you – and how good is your customer service? Honestly?
Yesterday, Anthony Payne, the managing director of estate agency data provider and platform for London agents, LonRes, tweeted out a note of despair.
Payne said: “Recently tried to view some houses in West Sussex on a Saturday. Told by 1 agent they were too busy and the other still hasn’t called back.”
He followed up with a second tweet: “I am a defender of traditional estate agency but they will have a limited lifespan against online if this is the service they offer.”
His tweets drew a response from commentator Henry Pryor, who said: “Traditional agents have got fat & lazy. Many will go under as the market hardens – and they deserve to.”
Russell Quirk, of eMoov, also responded on Twitter, saying: “And they worry about the ‘new enemy’ of online disruption when the low hanging fruit of success is staring them in the face.”
Comments (13)
So let me get this right. Mr Payne couldn’t get a viewing when he wanted ( no further info on when he wanted it, or the notice he gave ). One agent didn’t ring him back.
I’m seeing that West Sussex is just very busy and doing well at the moment.
And traditional agents are LonRes customers, why start bashing your customers? I do hope a follow up tweet exclaiming how well an agent did will follow.
Wonder why he is promoting online ? If all the traditional high street London agents decided to stop sending him their data, and paying him for the service he’d maybe start being a little bit nicer to them.
Don’t bite the hand that feeds you Mr Payne.
Innovation, service review and improvement and personal manner are key to agents surviving going forwards. You can decline the ability to show a property- but take a few seconds to explain why and then offer alternatives. Respomd to every e nquiry- even if its to advise that you are unable to help in this regard/instance.
However, I think a lot of this highlights key issues across our sector. I was at a property networking event today and had a lengthy chat with a mid-sized commercial agent who (like so many resi agents) bemoaned the fact that, especially in recent years, their fees have been reduced as other do so to secure business. However, what was far more interesting was the fact that ‘a’ he didnt feel his company had a single USP over their rivals (of course you cant get someone to pay you more for the same service elsewhere) and ‘b’ they had not innovated in any way, shape or form since he had joined the company 15 years ago.
Property, whether resi or commercial, is a vast market with huge opportunities but gone are the days when you can open an office and do little to nothing to earn those fees. If you dont want to operate on a cut fee basis (and why would you) then you’d better be damn clear on what sets you apart, where you deliver value, what is your USP and how you are innovating or about to innovate to tackle ‘X’ issue which you know drives Tenants/Landlords/Faciliteds Manageres etc spare.
Stop being victims and start evolving- or keep doing what youve always done and see your business shrink.
Shock horror that not every agent every contacted has been perfect in every regard. Yes, you might occasionally have to remind someone of something, or wait for a little while. Online or traditional agents, neither are every perfect.
I have to agree with Anthony. My colleague and I were, separately, looking for a new property. One of us in Wiltshire, the other in Hertfordshire, and the lack of response from a number of agents was shocking. I can understand if an agent is busy and cannot do a requested time, but the failure to respond to an enquiry is unforgivable.
We have at times asked a vendor or even a tenant to show a property for us if we could not do so, and we did not want to lose the applicant, and we respond to every call or email.
The lack of response from agents in our home areas, has however, made us recognise a business opportunity…
I sympathise with Payne’s pain. Last time I was looking to buy I had everything from superb to lousy viewing service from a range of agents.
None of us want to wait for anything any more. It is all about instant gratification – however unrealistic it may be.
When agents offer accompanied viewings as part of their service why not prepare vendors in advance by saying ‘ We will always endeavour to accompany viewings but on rare occasions, if all our staff are booked out, we will ask you to show the people round. Is that OK?’ I have never once had a vendor say no or fail to understand that staff resources are finite. It’s about how you present the issue to them.
BTW – A million years ago we would put the vendor’s telephone number on the details and let the applicants get on with making appointments for themselves. This was in the days when vendors were broadly honest and before corporate agents entered the market and by their greed destroyed the long-established professional ethics of agency, where touting was a no-no.
And we like to think things improve over time…
I will always discuss the possibility of vendors doing a viewing here or there when we are unavailable, but they like ourselves get busy and make plans, particularly at the weekend with families etc.
On the subject of vendors doing their own viewings, I see Purplebricks share price is going the right way again today!
Idiotic
charge more and provide more service!!
sellers will pay for a better service!!!
You are just to scared or too lazy to try to break out – agency is an expensive business when done properly – and profitable when done well
know where your pinch points are and employ the correct level of resources
no viewings = no sales
cant be organised well enough to respond to viewings promptly ? You deserve a battering from everyone – not just on-line
Agree with sb007ck – we start booking Saturday viewings on Mondays! Why do people think it’s bad ‘customer service’ if you don’t have 10 people sitting around waiting to do a viewing just on the off-chance someone rings? What if nobody materializes that particular weekend? Try doing that on fees of <£750! We’re not worried about the ‘new enemy’ of online disruption in this regard – in reality they are even less able to do viewings ‘on the fly’.
A bit more information on “when” he contacted the agent to arrange the viewings would be helpful. We’ve all had those people who call at 11am on Saturday asking to view 3 properties at 1:30 and then cannot understand that we are fully booked with people who contacted us 3-4 days before hand.
Fair point but what about the other agent the never got back to him?
In an age where Deliveroo automatically text you to apologise if your takeaway is running 5 mins late, the public’s expectations of customer service is moving off the chart.
We have to match pace (in my humble opinion) and take every oportunity to overdeliver (tech I feel can help the HSEA here).
It is a fair point about the estate agent that didn’t respond, but if this chap is such a “defender of traditional estate agency”, why state this “story” as if it is the norm, rather than expanding on his experience with these two estate agents compared to how other companies dealt with him.
As for Henry Prior, he should show a little respect for the industry that has given him so much, or are we expecting a Sarah Beeney style company to pop up from him in the near future.
It is really important that everyone doesn’t get defensive without full facts. Whether this is elaborated or not, the fact is it bears out the markets views and this only adds to it. Make sure you are the best and be honest, listen to all of your recorded Rightmove/OntheMarket/Zoopla telephone calls and see if your team are 100% If you are you will be market leader, but rest assured, as I found with my house move, agents were poor at best, shockingly bad at worst, but a few of the independents were human and charming, ultimately building a relationship with me! I was a genuine cash buyer, but you would have thought in some cases I was threatening to kidnap the agents wife and kids with the dreadful response I received…. lack of follow ups and don’t get me started on the lack of availability of agents to do viewings! Ohh the temptation to name and shame! I dearly wanted to test an online agent, but they didn’t have any suitable properties.
Couldn’t resist looking up the year end figures for LonRes to see what it does for the industry, a biz that Henry Pryor milked until he sold. What a lot of money those London boys pay for their aggregated data! Anthony Payne took the largest dividend of the shareholders….
My problem with this subject isn’t about getting defensive without full facts, it is that for some who claims to be a supporter or traditional estate agency, he could phrase his experience differently, much like you have done p-daddy.
“Although many estate agents we enquired through were very helpful, and interested in us, there was one estate agent who couldn’t accommodate us on the day, and annoyingly another who didn’t respond at all”
More than likely, he isn’t a supporter of traditional estate agents, and it is a completely fabricated experience used purely to stick the knife into our industry. Not saying negative experiences don’t exist, of course they do, but I am sure “house buyer Henry Pryor” has had similar experiences with online estate agents…but he just forgets about these conveniently.