As a real estate agent, there’s not much worse than finding out that one of your past clients has worked with a different agent for their lastest real estate transaction.

Often, it leaves you questioning where you went wrong; but for most agents, it’s simply because their past client forgot that they exist.

For a lot agents, this happens because once the deal is done, they never really talk to their clients again, and instead, just wait for them to reach out when they need to make another real estate decision, assuming they will do so because their experience was so good. And of course, that’s not a very effective strategy to have.

As an agent, you have a lot of competition, and a lot of other agents are constantly bombarding as many people as they can with their marketing material, some of which are your current or previous clients; so if you don’t remind your past clients you exist, another agent will do it instead.

★ Want to learn more about building a marketing strategy that helps your past clients remember you? Have a look at these posts:

• How (and Why) to Build a Real Estate Marketing Segmentation Strategy
• Building a Real Estate Marketing Stickiness Strategy
• Why Your Real Estate Marketing Strategy Should Lead with Authenticity

The average real estate transaction happens every 5 years or so, which is plenty of time for someone to forget about you if they never hear from you.

And in that 5 year period of time, they’re going to see A LOT of other marketing material from A LOT of other agents.

So what do you do? How do you make sure your past clients remember that you exist when they’re making their next real estate decision?

The answer is to make sure you have a past client connection plan in place, where your goal is to build continuous connections with past clients, based on providing value, so it’s a lot more difficult for them to forget about you.

A past client connection plan begins when the deal is done, and a person has finished moving through the cycle of lead to client to past client.

When it comes to connecting with past clients, there are a lot of different ways to do that, but ideally, the best ways are the one that provide value to them and allow you to continually prove your expertise and build connections.

For example, you could build one through:

• Email marketing, by periodically and consistently sending them emails that outline the current value of their home, plus CMA information about other comparable homes in their neighborhood.
• Postcard marketing, by sending them (and everyone in their neighbourhood) print material that outlines property values, current homes for sale, and past sold information, for homes in their neighborhood.
• Event planning, by creating community based events that you can invite past clients to, to show them you appreciate them and that you’re connected to the community.

But of course, there’s a fine line between building connections and providing value, and being annoying, so while a past client might appreciate a call or you reaching out every once in a while, too much connection and make them avoid working with you too.

The truth is, each of your clients will be different, so there isn’t really a one-sized fits all approach. Ideally, you should have multiple connection strategies in place based on how and how often you think they want to be reminded about you.

Want to improve your overall lead generation plan? Download our Lead Management Workbook. It’s a self-guided, interactive workbook where you answer questions about your current lead generation plan, outline what’s working and what isn’t working, and put together a plan to improve it. And, it’s free to download.

Author: Andre Bodnar

Founder, Business Development

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