Let's get personal for a minute. Who are you? Be specific. What’s your specialty? What do you enjoy most? Who are you personally and how does that affect your business? And, most importantly, how can you use it to your advantage?

Easy. Quit trying to attract the masses, and work on defining your professional and personal goals. Narrow your market. Yes NARROW it. Determine which type of client you enjoy most. With what group do you relate most naturally? Who are your all-time favorite clients and what do they have in common?

Determine the answer to these questions and you can niche your market, define yourself, and specialize your work. By doing so, you can guarantee that you spend your time working only in those areas that bring you both personal and professional satisfaction and work only with those individuals whose company you enjoy.

Once you narrow the playing field, you must then write your position into your marketing materials. Use a strong tagline to quickly convey your specialization and pointedly describe your own area of expertise in every letter, every e-mail, and on your website.

Job One in marketing for real estate success -- Make yourself memorable.

Example one:

Debby A. Smith, of John L. Scott Real Estate in the Seattle area of Washington, seeks a specific type of client. When we first discussed her target market, she had a definitive idea of what she wants to do and an even clearer vision of what she doesn’t want to do. She doesn’t want to target the subdivisions. She doesn’t want to sell “run-of-the-mill” homes. She doesn’t want to cater to the investor or the commercial market. And she doesn’t want to become obsessed with her bottom line.

Debby believes a home is a reflection of those that inhabit it and bring it to life. So she specializes in matching individual families to a home as perfect for them as they are for it. Places, like people, have a definite personality and Debby is an expert at matching particular people with their perfect property.

She likes houses with character and has learned, after 19 years in the business, that she prefers working with the type of people who seek or desire an individualistic home. Debby will openly admit that these “creative types” are often more challenging to match to their perfect home than people who merely want to buy a house for financial reasons. But Debby doesn’t mind. She enjoys watching people interact with the “feel” of a place, she welcomes the adventure of finding the right dwelling for each individual, and she revels in the satisfaction of knowing that the home she just sold is a perfect fit for the client she was hired to serve.

During our first meeting, we developed an initial tagline for Debby “Matching unique individuals to unusual properties,” but it didn’t quite reflect her goal. It was a “working” tagline. She wanted to include an openness to her studies in feng shui, her understanding of the importance of physical personal space in homes, and a reflection of the feeling of serendipity when that perfect match is achieved. She said these things were like magic and they fascinate her. We continued defining her personal/professional mission and playing with the words until we developed a more targeted tagline with words that were naturally positive in connotation as well as appealing to her specific target audience:

“The Home Wizard – Matching you to
your perfect home”

“The Home Wizard” reflects more than merely skill, it conjures visions of magic, energy and sparks of inspiration. In the current age of technology, the term “wizard” is also associated with something that leads you gently through a complicated process – usually during software installation. And the “Matching you to your perfect home” makes her message personal – not “clients” or “individuals” or “buyers” but to YOU. And the goal isn’t a sale, it’s a perfect match.

To further promote her niche, she uses language such as “From cottages to castles…” to reflect the “feel” of the homes she offers her clientele. Unique, personalized service is her trademark and Debby has begun using that to help define herself and personalize her message in venues – such as letters, brochures and the Web – which are traditionally considered more impersonal. Many agents say their mission is to provide a good match between buyer and home, but Debby lives it.

Debby sells what she loves. She has melded her own lifestyle, her own knowledge and appreciation of a particular mindset to offer likeminded clients a clear advantage. She understands what her clients want and goes out of her way to deliver it.

As a result, she has a thriving business doing what she enjoys most. She has defined and advertised her area of expertise in an industry that is traditionally more generalist than specialist. And, although many real estate agents may specialize, if they don’t communicate that specialization, it doesn’t really exist for potential new clients.

So... Niche. Specialize and communicate things you are passionate about. Make your statement memorable. Enjoy your work. And be successful!

Angela Allen is our WORD MAGIC columnist and a RESS Certified VA. You can visit her web site at Wicked Wordcraft and contact her via e-mail at ala@wickedwordcraft.com