In our last blog post about One Team, One Experience I talked heavily about alignment. If the move from online to onsite is done well, it should feel natural from the buyer’s perspective. Exciting, even. The OSC should be building anticipation, not creating confusion. It should sound more like: “I’d love for you to meet my good friend; they’re going to have a much better handle on those specific house questions and help you take the next step.” That is a handoff. Not:…
Don’t Say I Don’t Know: An OSC’s Guide to Building Trust – Scenario Two
In part one of Don’t Say, “I don’t know.” We attacked a scenario that’s easy to fall into if you are a brand new OSC, or even when you have been doing this for a while, but there may be things you just don’t know. Saying “I don’t know,” is the quickest way to kill trust with a new home buyer and have them rudely asking for someone who does know. But in scenario two…
Don’t Say I Don’t Know: An OSC’s Guide to Building Trust – Scenario One
As I got going writing this up, I realized it was waaaaayyyyy too long for a single blog post. So here’s part one of three! As an online sales counselor, whether you are new, or you’ve been doing this a while there are questions you simply can’t answer. Either because you don’t know the answer, the information doesn’t exist, or it’s not your question to answer… I’ll explain these scenarios in a three part series,…
Guest Post: Not So Random Advice From, Kimberly Mackey, A Top Trainer in the Building Industry
Guest Post by Kimberly Mackey Founder of New Homes Solutions Consulting Co-Host of Sales & Marketing Power Hour National Trainer & Speaker Recently Kimberly Mackey, co-host of the Sales & Marketing Power Hour & National Speaker, posted a thread on her Facebook group asking for “Random Advice” No specific topic, just good advice. To start the ball rolling she gave us a true gem that needs to be heard by leadership, online sales, and sales…
Understanding Emotions… Not Playing on Emotions
It’s often said the buying a home is an emotional purchase. While of course budget, location, and timeline for needing or wanting to move is important, there is a deeper psychology that comes into play when purchasing a home. At its core, owning a home begins with the foundational levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. This motivational theory in psychology from American psychologist, Abraham Maslow’s 1943 paper, “A theory of Human Motivation,” published in the…
Guest Post: Code Cracking – Unlocking the Power of Analytics in Interactive Floor Plans
Guest Post by Stuart Platt Managing Partner Outhouse, LLC You implemented Interactive Floor Plans (IFPs) on your website months, if not years ago. Maybe you have seen a report that your IFPs are experiencing a lot of visits which is fantastic; but what else can you find out? You ask yourself, what other information can I gain from Google Analytics and how can I take advantage of this data? Depending on when you read…
Why Do You Need Executive Coaching with an Online Sales Program?
Whether you are setting up a new online sales program, or working on auditing, improving, or revamping an old OSC program, whoever is going to lead the OSC program or team, needs to be on the same page and understand how to communicate goals to the entire company. I’ve said it before, training an OSC cannot happen in a bubble. The leadership of the company, marketing, and sales teams all need to know what to…
What Does “When in Doubt Send It Out” Mean?
Yes, we all want to be setting appointments. Especially if your leads have slowed down, but we don’t want to set just any appointment. We want to set strong appointments that will convert, otherwise we aren’t doing what OSCs are supposed to do. You may have heard the term, “When in doubt, send it out.” But what exactly does that mean? It doesn’t mean short-cut your job as an online sales counselor and bypass the…
Five Things Leadership Should Know About Online Sales
Sometimes the people at the top don’t understand what Online Sales is, what Online Sales Counselors do, and why this role and the program are so important. 1. This is not a “Catch All” position – The online sales program isn’t a place to dump all the odds and ends in the company. An online sales counselor is not a closing coordinator, they are not the social media manager, they are not the graphic designer,…
Don’t Sacrifice Website Usability for Design
Websites are the online sales models for the new home building industry. You’ve probably heard that before. Just like models are constantly changing as we build new and better homes, close out communities, and start new models – your website too needs to grow and change, but one thing needs to remain the same. It needs to address the needs of your buyers and make the important things easy to find. Sometimes when we do…
Turnkey Solutions Sound Great… But Are They?
I often hear builders say they want a turnkey solution for online sales. Really, they want turnkey solutions for everything. The truth is, almost anything worth while takes time to learn and master. As most builders like to remind me, they are different from their competitors. While we don’t need to re-invent the wheel every time we start up a new online sales program, there will be nuances that are different and require a more…