Because your words are often a prospect’s first impression of you, one careless email, letter, or blog post can cost you a listing.
Before homeowners invite you into their living room, they’re judging your professionalism by your words. Your website, emails, blog posts, and prospecting letters all help answer one question:
Can I trust this person to sell my home?
If that first impression is poor, it often becomes the last impression.
Small writing mistakes can cost real estate agents listings, so let’s look at some ways that a real estate agent (or anyone else) can ruin their chances for success by making a poor first impression with their words.
Making assumptions: That’s just rude.
Some sales trainers actually advise agents to make assumptions. For instance, one recommends beginning a letter with “I know you’re thinking of selling your home.”
That breaks rule #1 in writing a business letter (Never, ever begin with “I”) while being downright rude. If I received that message my first impression and reaction would be “You don’t know me and you don’t know what I think. Get lost.”
Perhaps you’d react differently, but is it worth taking the chance?
Failure to proofread – 2 or 3 times – can cost you the client.
Incorrect grammar and misused words are serious stumbling blocks. They throw the whole meaning of sentences off track, confuse readers, and make the writer look sloppy, at best. They give a very negative first impression.
The list of words that real estate agents commonly misuse is so long that I wrote a whole e-book about real estate grammar: A Grammar Guide for Real Estate Agents. If you have trouble with grammar and word usage, get your own copy today. Just click here to learn more and order your copy. Following the advice in this easy-to-understand guide could mean the difference between landing that new listing or watching it go to someone else.
Thanks to technology, seeing a strange word in the middle of a sentence is becoming more and more common.
Why is technology to blame? Because so many are now using voice recognition software, then failing to proofread.
Here are some examples from sentences I’ve read online and in print:
- “sunlight coming threw the window”
- “with home we can identify”
- “fireless advertiser”
- “there new home”
Other goofy mistakes that can cost you the listing:
- Email subject lines that read: “Insert subject line.” Oops!
- Letters that read “Dear <name>”
- “Click here” links with no link.
The bottom line: We all need to treat our words with care. We all make mistakes, but careful proofreading can usually save us from looking foolish.
Remember –
When you want to make a positive first impression with your words, I’m here to help.
I can’t be there to write your day-to-day emails, but I can provide you with prospecting letters – either custom or from my collection of pre-written letters. I can also write your agent bio, your buyer and seller pages, your community pages, your personal brochures, and even your property descriptions.
When you need help, write me: marte@copybymarte.com
~~~
Before becoming a real estate copywriter, Marte Cliff spent nearly two decades selling real estate—first as an agent and then as an owner/broker. Her company was the sixth agency to open in a small North Idaho town, yet within a little over a year, through outstanding service and focused marketing, it grew to control more than half of the local market.
Today Marte helps real estate agents across the country attract the clients who are the best fit for their business through professionally written bios, prospecting letters, and practical marketing advice based on real-world experience.
AI can generate words.
Marte’s job is to discover what makes you worth remembering –
then write about that.
