If listings are the lifeblood of agents... why are most of them anemic?

If listings are the lifeblood of an agent, why do some agents treat them with such distain? You've seen them while cruising through the MLS, looking for that perfect house for your new buyers. You add all of the criteria that they're looking for, the price range and click "OK". After a little spin through the MLS, it returns 20 properties that match your criteria. When you start to dig through them, it's amazing to see the complete disregard that some agents have for their listings.  Here are some examples to name just a few:

• No photos - the death knell for a listing, ESPECIALLY in the first 10 days of the listing hitting the market
  
• Descriptions that look like newspaper ads - "2br,3bth,grt loc8shn,clos 2 evrthng... $800,000 wont last!"  Wow, if that doesn't scream "buy me!" I don't know what does.
• Typos - Here's an actual listing I saw: "Enjoy you're own Concert pool this Sumer"  ("You're" instead of "your". "Concert" instead of "concrete". "Sumer" instead of "Summer)

There are so many examples I could give about this scenario, but the simple truth is, should we really be shocked when a FSBO is hesitant to work with an agent or the fact that real estate agent jokes rank right up there with lawyer jokes?

Quick Comparison:
Which listing might your buyers pay attention to more? (Given a 200 character limit)

"This home has it all! 4 bedroom, 3 bath with a large backyard, custom carpet and tile work in the kitchen. You'll love this house!"  -or-  "Located in central Edmond, this beautiful home boasts 4 large bedrooms and three baths, custom tile work in the chefs kitchen. Built in 2007 this home has all of the luxury you seek in your next home."

Your listing is your brand. It's your first impression. It's your calling card. Simply put, it's how buyers, sellers and even other agents view your approach to your business and what you'll be like to work with if their buyers decide to buy your listing.

I hear agents tell me that it's just so "time consuming" to enter a listing (especially if they have to enter it twice, whew!) Well, it should be time consuming. In this day and age, we should be thrilled to flesh out as many details about a listing that we can. If we have to enter it twice, that's just another chance to get it right. It used to be (when a listing went on the market and sold in the same day) a little easier to get away with sloppy listings because they didn't stick around. No more is this the case, and now we need our listings to stand out from the other 50 listings for sale in the same neighborhood - and in some cases on the same block.

As I drove through a neighborhood last weekend to drop off my son at a friend's house, I saw approximately 20 houses for sale in their subdivision. Most of these were clusters of homes that were on the same block or street. However, on every one of these listings I was shocked to see simply the proverbial yard sign and flyer box (most empty) with no other distinction between any of the houses. Oddly, every home was listed by a different agent so it tells me that for every seller that saw their neighbors house up for sale, there was nothing that differentiated the agent that caught the neighbors attention and made them at least inquire about listing with that agent.

As a seller, would I maybe look at an agent that had a "See the virtual tour of this home at www..." or "Need more info? Visit www.2701DuPont.com"? If I saw an agent that deployed these sales tools, would I be more inclined to ask my neighbor that's listing the home, "Hey, does your agent do this on all of the houses they sell?" Heck, I probably would even call to tell that agent, "I want you to use all those things to sell my home."

The point is that we should be doing everything we can to provide an extra level of service with our listings. Not just to combat the "What did you do for me" mentality that we sometimes get post-sale, but to become "the" agent in your sellers mind and to help garner numerous referrals in the future.

That means that we need to take advantage of all opportunities to do the following:

1. Write full descriptions about our listings.
2. Provide virtual tours.
3. Create a Podcast.
4. Create branded brochures.
5. Use marketing programs to announce Open Houses.
6. Shoot a homemade video and post it to your site.
7. Record an audio tour and post it.
8. Add maps to your listing.
9. Share your listing with other agents on their sites (Listing XChange).
10. Automatically syndicate your listing to the hottest real estate sites out there.
11. Write a Blog.
    ActiveRain Bloggers, "UNITE"!
12. Send "Just Listed" postcards and announcements.
13. Create a dedicated website for each listing.  Example: http://www.2701dupont.com  

Now, before you throw out the "Uh, yeah Eric, BUT that would cost a TON of money," let me finish. In my XSite from a la mode, most of these features don't cost a thing except for my time. And I'm sorry, but to make 3-4% per listing, spending an average of two hours per listing doing all of the items I mentioned is nothing; but my return on investment (my time and very little money) is huge. Mix that with the fact that if I garner just ONE referral or have one seller in that same neighborhood that noticed my marketing methods of information available about the home and that received my "Just Listed" postcard, I've doubled or in some cases tripled my investment.

We've always had to justify our commission rates in some fashion or at some point in getting the listing.  "I've got a great personality" doesn't always cut it anymore.  However, when sellers have seen my marketing campaigns that I've deployed, it's actually funny that I rarely get that objection any more!