Staying ahead in today’s highly competitive real estate market is the name of the game. And for Scott Wilkinson, president of Wilkinson & Associates ERA Powered in Charlotte, N.C, partnering with Homes.com has been a key differentiator when it comes to generating quality leads, securing listings and drawing as much traffic as possible to his company’s site.
A partnership that came about two years ago after franchising with ERA, Wilkinson points to name recognition as one of the biggest benefits associated with working with Homes.com.
“Homes.com is a widely recognized name, a site seen by a lot of people as they search for homes on the Internet,” says Wilkinson, whose company has sold a lot more Internet homes this past year than ever before. While the spike in sales can be attributed to factors such as increased consumer confidence and restrictions being loosened, Wilkinson attributes the company’s partnership with Homes.com as a huge advantage when it comes to the sheer number of leads coming into the company, as well as increased exposure.
“We’ve seen an 8-9 percent increase in traffic to our website, which is in direct relation to an increase of 8-9 percent more leads coming in,” says Wilkinson. With Homes.com Broker Preferred Listings in each of the seven markets the company serves, Wilkinson & Associates ERA Powered also appears in the top two or three positions in any page search, driving a lot of traffic to their company site. “Taking advantage of anything we can to gain a competitive edge, the enhanced listings offered through Homes.com provide even more exposure since they come up first during searches initiated by prospective buyers. They also keep the brand front and center by incorporating our logo and branding into each listing.”
To ensure that no leads fall through the cracks, each and every lead that comes into the company goes through the Internet Leads Team or LeadRouter so that agents can respond to consumer requests instantaneously, allowing prospective buyers to go from searching on Homes.com to talking to an agent within a matter of seconds. “You can get a million leads, but they don’t mean anything if you don’t have a way to follow-up with those leads,” adds Wilkinson.
While having a system in place so that leads can be routed to agents as quickly as possible is a crucial piece of the puzzle, touting the advantages of the partnership to both buyers and sellers is just as important. “The exposure we are getting from Homes.com not only creates more leads, it also draws in more buyers and increases our sellers,” says Wilkinson. “In fact, when out on listing presentations, we make sure sellers understand that we can get their properties a lot more exposure than the competition because of our partnership with Homes.com.”
In today’s market especially, real estate professionals can’t afford to overlook the importance of exposing their website to the widest audience of prospective buyers. “Keeping our website in front of prospective buyers is all about making sure we get the sale rather than someone else,” concludes Wilkinson.
For more information, please visit www.connect.homes.com.
