Last year, we launched our partnership with The Keyes Company, a program to help local business partners who provide services to buyers and sellers. For these small businesses, we represent a direct channel to customers who need their services today. We connect our customers to these businesses when they are at a point in the moving process where they need moving services. For Keyes, this program helps their customers by making it easy to find any service they need, and for local businesses, it is a fire hose of new business. In the past, we have charged these companies a small advertising fee; however, we just changed that.
More than a practical term, local business refers to the owners of the companies that contribute in a significant way to the moving experience of customers working with a real estate professional associated with Keyes. Many of these livelihoods have been devastated by COVID-19. These businesses are more to me than trusted partners. I talk to their owners regularly as friends, and I care about them. Apart from the camaraderie, our partners comprise a collective of small businesses that operate in the communities that we serve, and we need them to survive. Each individual partner delivers services that help Keyes’ customers move, making them vital components in driving customer satisfaction with the process of using one of their REALTORS® to buy or sell a home.
The impact of COVID-19 caused many companies to cut expenses. Keyes was no different. However, MooveGuru is not seen as an expense. It operates at break-even—or, better yet, the brokerage may get a few extra dollars from the service, so it was not considered in expense-cutting measures. Keyes’ management team reviewed the program and discovered that they had an opportunity to leverage their remarkable web presence and customer records to do some good for local businesses. They contacted us and we worked together to construct a program that would allow our local business partners to participate in the MooveGuru moving concierge program for no cost.
It was a delightful experience to contact these local business owners and give them the good news. Each business was given the ability to promote their local business from our mover automation for free for six months, connecting them to Keyes customers through MooveGuru, and they were delighted. Just like MooveGuru and the real estate industry, these local businesses were looking at every expense. I suspect that when they looked at the line item for advertising with us, they deliberated the benefits of maintaining the relationship vs. saving the cash. By waiving the advertising fee, we made that decision easier.
We are proud to have partnered with Keyes in support of our neighbors who own the local businesses that our customers rely upon when they move, and strengthening those relationships is a valuable use of our time for many reasons. Remember, small things in life extended in times of need often build relationships that endure a lifetime.
Brian Friemel is president of MooveGuru. For more information, please visit www.mooveguru.com.
