Marketing is from Mars, PR is from Venus

As an estate agent, marketing is in your DNA. You are good at understanding what makes people buy, sell, rent and let property. In fact, if you’re still in business, having survived the recent recession, you must be spectacularly good. But whilst I’m handing out the plaudits, let me suggest something which is probably not your strong point. It is a skill which takes creativity, contacts and commitment to get consistently right. It is public relations – getting you and your properties into the editorial content of newspapers, magazines, websites, TV and radio – something we have been doing for the past 15 years. Mainly laid to lawn? Why estate agents talk in a way unlike anyone else on the planet eludes me. Although the two are closely related, PR is not marketing. And the problem for estate agents is that the things which encourage someone to buy or let a property are not the same things which encourage a journalist to write about it. In other words, when it comes to PR, you have to stop thinking like an estate agent and start thinking like a journalist. Buyers might be tempted by “a stunning property with a  flexible layout…