Recently, after talking to a group of professionals in the construction business, the local distributor of Tyvek handed my colleague his card. Among its many purposes, Tyvek is used to wrap buildings at construction sites. The card was itself made from Tyvek, which makes for a fun, tactile, brand-reinforcing experience. I don’t doubt that many conversations have started with, “wow – what’s that card made of?”
A business card is a specific example of a brand touchpoint, a place where your brand as a real estate agent and your target home buyers meet.
Experienced marketers often say “Everything Communicates.” That’s a broad concept, but brand touchpoints bring it down to reality. Everything, from your business card to your actual product or service, says something about your brand as a real estate agent – and it’s your job to know what it’s saying.
Effective marketers know that they have to be intentional about everything that they do. In other words, you have to decide what you want to known for before you brand yourself. A message is crafted about why you are the best choice for the home buyers you want to work with. The voice, personality, and look-and-feel have to be right. After that, you can express that message using all of the channels of communication available.
Those channels are your brand touchpoints. They can include advertising, marketing collateral materials, web site and stationery. Those are the obvious ones. The touchpoints you don’t think of, though, are the ones that are likely cause you problems. These are things like voicemail messages, phone manner (of everyone who answers the phone on your behalf) and the appearance of coworkers, car, or office.
To expand on this, you want to ensure that each of these touchpoints is actually building up the “know, like, and trust” factor with your ideal clients. If you want to be known for being extremely businesslike, then your voicemail should be very to-the-point and your dress more sophisticated. If you wish your brand to be more folksy, then your voicemail can include a more friendly or inspirational message, and your dress may be more casual.
The most important thing is consistency. You want each brand touchpoint to be reinforcing the same message. Don’t let hidden brand touchpoints ruin your real estate agent marketing. Remember that everything communicates. That abrupt voicemail message or dirty car could undo a lot of hard work.