What do you suppose is the most important – the X factor in real estate marketing – to achieve the successful sale of your home? Realtors jump on trends in marketing without giving new tactics, technology, and methods much critical thought. Drone video. 3D virtual tours. “Coming soon” signs. Virtual staging. AI-generated ad copy. Exclusive realtor network marketing sites.

Regardless of the specific tools and ideas employed, following a robust marketing project plan is crucial to achieve consistent results and to account for the variability that market dynamics, buyer behaviour, property issues and legal matters can introduce along the way. We follow a rigourous marketing plan – read about the OttawaAgent.ca Property Marketing Plan here. But within the framework of a great project plan, and in selecting specific tools and tactics, what factors drive the plan toward success with as few twists and turns as possible?

The X Factor In Real Estate Marketing

The answer: managing expectations. I’ve learned over the years that every method, tool, and step in marketing a property steers the process toward success in direct proportion to how well it sets expectations for the prospective buyers who will pay the most, meet more of the seller’s terms, and cause fewer hassles and setbacks along the way.

This applies to fundamental aspects of the process as well as it does to using the latest tricks.

Great House, But a Bit Too Small

A friend called to tell me he’d been trying to sell his house for a few months. He’d apparently hired a brokerage that provided low cost listing services. I asked how much traffic he’d seen – how many potential buyers had come to see the property. He reached into a kitchen drawer and pulled out a stack of at least 30 business cards from realtors – buyers’ agents. I asked him what feedback he’d received from all these showings.

He said there had been no big complaints, no one said anything about the price; many of the buyers said it was a great house, but a little small for their needs.

Hmmmm. I confess I was not entirely surprised. I’d looked at the MLS listing of the property prior to stopping by to chat with him. The house was advertised as a four-bedroom home. Three above grade, and one below grade bedroom. Touring the home, there were two bedrooms on the second floor, plus a third bedroom-sized room with a closet that had three walls and one open end overlooking the eating area below. It was an attractive design and would make a beautiful den, art loft, or for some, a sleeping area.

The basement was completely open – no maze of hallways to navigate, or strangely arranged rooms as is common in many non-professionally designed DIY basement finishing jobs. In the far rear corner of the basement was a double bed beside a non-egress-compatible window.

My friend counted the loft and the bed in the corner of the basement as bedrooms. In his reasoning, a four-bedroom house is worth more than a 2 bedroom plus den / loft house, and it made sense to pitch the property to buyers looking to pay for a larger home. You can see the problem – people coming to see the house had 2 or 3 or 4 kids in tow and expected a four-bedroom house might work for them. Especially at the attractive price that was lower than other four-bedroom homes in the area. But clearly the house was too small for their needs.

My friend hired me to take over marketing – we positioned the property for what it was, and it began to attract young couples with zero to one child, down-sizing empty nesters and single people. It sold in short order for close to the original asking price. This is a lesson in positioning – but the key is that incorrect positioning created the wrong expectations for potential buyers. Positioning is the marketing “P” ( learn about the 5 P’s of property marketing here ) that is most focused on setting buyer expectations. We think of positioning as targeting the right buyers – this is simply another way of saying, “set expectations correctly and they will come”.

Immaculate, But

An older couple was referred to me by their son, as their home had languished on the market for several months. Checking out the expired MLS listing I assessed it to be a beautiful home in a neighbourhood with sprawling yards – a “country in the City” vibe. Here’s a snipped from the ad copy (the public description in the MLS database that carries through to Realtor.ca):

Impeccably maintained Bungalow in <neighbourhood>! HUGE Kitchen/Eating Area with High End Appliances, Walnut Cabinets & Walk-out to Balcony. Spacious Living Room with floor to ceiling windows & dbl sided Fireplace that is shared with Formal Dining Room. Master Bdrm has 2 Large Closets & Full Ensuite Bath!Lower Level Family Rm filled with Lrg Windows & Walk-out to Gardens that are magazine worthy! BRAND NEW SEPTIC TANK & ROOF.

What images does this description evoke? Let’s say you were to go visit the home… what would you expect to find? My read suggests a very nice home that has been well maintained and updated, with high end contemporary finishes. It doesn’t actually say that the kitchen and bathrooms have been updated, but somehow the implication is there.

Upon visiting the home, I found it was a remarkable display of period construction and architecture preserved in its original glory. Virtually all of the finishes were original. The walnut kitchen was solid as a … well, walnut tree. Beautiful. But in a vintage way.

The home was not selling because it was attracting buyers looking not only for move-in condition, which it offered, but the promise of not needing to renovate or update anything significant for many years. Ninety-five percent of buyers today (admittedly a made-up number, but anecdotally not far off) do not want to lift a finger for the first 5 to 10 years. They don’t all need everything in the house to be brand new, but they typically are not looking for an all-original vintage home, even if it is in impeccable shape.

There was another, more subtle setting of expectations at work in the marketing of this property. The asking price was set at $547,000. What does a number like $547,000 suggest to you as a buyer? Odd, precise numbers can relay a relative firmness – potentially a lack of willingness to negotiate.

Our re-marketing plan for this home involved:

• new photos; the previous photos were quite good – I didn’t feel they were impeding the sale under previous management. But we still improved upon them because that’s what we do
• a round-number asking price of $550,000 that both avoided implying the sellers are not flexible, but also sat on the border of two potentially common price ranges that buyers might search (up to $550K plus $550K and above) – note that we technically raised the price of a home that had not been selling
• re-positioning the home through targetted ad copy that painted an accurate picture of the home’s condition and cosmetic vintage, while capitalizing on the appeal that the specific architecture has for some niche buyers – below is an excerpt

Perched high on a manicured lot in picturesque <neighbourhood>, this mid-Century styled raised bungalow offers a vibrant lifestyle connected to the outdoors. Peaceful views of lawns and mature trees from picture windows in every room on both levels and a bright open layout that also incorporates distinct formal spaces. Solid infrastructure allows you to focus on selective cosmetic redecorating while retaining period charm as desired.

With these changes, showing activity was slower than with the previous agent because the listing made it clear that the home did not offer freshly updated cosmetics. Fewer buyers are interested in a vintage home in original but excellent condition. The home sold in less than one month. All we really changed was the X factor in real estate marketing: setting the correct expectations.

It looked so different…

Working with dozens of clients every year, and walking with them into hundreds of properties, I witness a wide range of reactions. One of the most common includes not only verbal comments but a physical manifestation of letdown. Buyers walk into a home that appeared to be a beauty online, that does not come close to measuring up to the photos or virtual tours that drew them in.

“It looked so different online…” – a phrase I can count on hearing almost every week – more today than in previous years. Real estate agents jump on every new marketing trend without a critical thought to their effectiveness. One of the biggest culprits today is virtual staging. This is software generation of furnishings and accents added to the base photographs, usually of vacant spaces. The photos make the home look incredibly inviting. But the buyers show up to the home and it feels cold, empty, small, and every flaw is visible.

The worst thing you can do in real estate marketing is set the buyer up for disappointment. Even a buyer who might otherwise like the home cannot always get over that sinking feeling.

If you’re marketing a vacant property, either stage it in real life or leave it vacant. An “art gallery” technique placing accent pieces but no furniture can warm and brighten spaces less expensively than staging with furniture. Make sure the space is spotlessly clean, freshly painted, flooring in good condition, attractively lit, and smells inviting naturally. Make it look and feel in real life as it is portrayed in the marketing. If your agent wants to take short cuts by using virtual staging, and especially if they seem proud of their avant-garde services, I recommend interviewing other agents – find one who will put in the work to present the property well in reality.

It Works Backwards Too

On the flip side of disappointed-buyer-syndrome due to setting unrealistic expectations are properties whose qualities are under-represented in marketing. Tying some ideas together, the agents who employ 3D virtual tours or software-generated staging are making an honest effort to ensure they maximize presentation of the property. They are trying to make the property look as beautiful as possible to increase buyers’ perception of value. But as illustrated, it backfires when the property does not live up to the hype.

I also regularly encounter gorgeous properties whose marketing is blasé, or downright poor. There is the modern loft-style condominium apartment I came across recently with photos taken on a phone in a mix of portrait and landscape orientation from a variety of vertical angles. But more commonly there exceptional are properties with clear, well composed and well exposed photos accompanied by lacklustre descriptions.

One example that has always stuck with me is from a home that sat on the market for more than a year and failed to sell. The agent re-listed the property several times, without ever changing a word or a photo (a topic for another day: sharpening your saw – keeping your marketing alive in a slow market). This property was sublime. It had features, layout, and infrastructure characteristics that were truly unique and outstanding. The ad copy made use of about 30% of the available space for text in the public description field on MLS. It comprised a few short sentences and the only colourful adjective employed was “wonderful”, which it used three times.

The purpose of the photos is to grab a buyer’s attention, give them a solid representation of what to expect, and draw them in to book an in-person showing. The purpose of the ad copy is dual: targeting and inspiring. Target the wrong buyers and you impede the sale by attracting people who are not likely to purchase the property. Fail to inspire and you might leave a few potential buyers sitting on the couch browsing rather than feeling the urgency to come and see the home.

Pricing Sends a Message

Remember: pricing sends a message. Does the seller think their home is the most valuable in the neighbourhood, deserving of a sale price above all similar properties that have been selling recently? Is the seller motivated? Is the seller realistic? Is the seller flexible? Does the home appear to offer incredible value or is it run of the mill compared to the 25 homes you’ve seen so far on your buying journey.

Buyers often develop a better sense of current market value than appraisers or realtors because they focus on a certain type of home within specific locations and within a budgeted price range. They visit everything within those bounds, and not much outside of them. They become laser focused and can compare feature by feature properties recently listed and sold. You aren’t likely to fool them. Be sure your asking price sets the right expectations for value.

Energy and Emotion

Many buyers are analytical, but emotions and energy play a major role in the home buying process. The X factor in real estate marketing is nailing buyer expectations. The best play is setting expectations accurately in marketing, and if possible, exceeding them slightly in reality. The buyer who is compelled by what they see of your property online, in comparison to dozens of other homes they’ve assessed digitally and in person, and whose natural energy for the prospect of finding “the one” is not only maintained, but slightly enhanced when they walk through your front door, is one who is most likely to bring you an equally enticing offer.