12 Factors Produce Happy Homebuyers

By Paul M. Thompson

One of the many outstanding seminars at last week's International Builders Show was entitled Best Practices for Providing an Absolutely Incredible Homebuying Experience. Presented by acclaimed customer service guru Carol Smith of Monument, Colorado and Bob Mirman of Irvine, California, it featured 12 factors in creating happy homebuyers.

They should become the commandments for customer service for all home builders because they hold the key to the future of your business: referrals. Smith and Mirman pointed out that it's not enough these days to create simply "satisfied" buyers but to strive for the "evangelical" buyer who will, over the 10 months after the sale, refer you to an average of 6.1 other potential home buyers. Nineteen percent of the time, those 6.1 referrals led to another sale.

Smith and Mirman also pointed out that today's buyers seek more than just a "quality" home. They expect that. What they really crave -- and what will bring them back again -- is a great home buying "experience."

The speakers pointed out that there are really only two fundamental ways for builders to enhance that experience. One is through improving the performance of staff and trades professionals. The second is to manage the expectations of your buyers… and exceed them. Only by exceeding expectations can you create what author Ken Blanchard calls "Raving Fans," who will happily recommend you to others.   

Here are the 12 factors: 

1. Start Early to align your buyer's expectations with your company's capabilities, with respect to the product, the home buying process and the services you provide.
   
2. Develop Trust by always delivering more than you promise. If you think you can clear the punch list in 20 days, advise customers it will be completed within 30. Those who promise it in five are setting unrealistic expectations and jeopardizing customer trust.
   
3. Be Positive even if it's bad news you are delivering to your buyer. Read all your advertising and collateral materials, and replace harsh words like "no" and "can't" with softer, more positive language.
   
4. Beat What You Promise. Let buyers know that the home you're building for them involves a 5 1/2 month process and 350 people (speaking 16 different languages). There will be problems in the process but assure buyers that you will solve those problems, make good on your promises, and give them that positive home buying experience.
   
5. Set Expectations through a systematic process. Create within your company an "E Team" for setting expectations and focus on such factors as how often buyers can expect to be contacted by you, the quality of the home at move-in, and the time it will take for you to respond to warranty requests. All this involves intense internal discussions and joint decisions by your key team members.
   
6. Use Teachable Moments to educate your homebuyers on the home building process. For example, builders should determine how best to tell their customers about the pitfalls of low-flush toilets, explaining that they are mandated by a federal standard. In every case on matters like this, builders should determine their position, find positive ways to express that position, and incorporate the position into their communications system.
   
7. Create the "Experience." As stated above, buyers expect high quality. What they want is that caring attitude by the builder, the kind you might have if you were building a home for your Mom. Such devotion to the home building experience is captured in the positioning statements of some of the nation's leading builders: Lennar's "Tickled, Delighted and Happy" (TDH) goal for its homebuyers; Shea Homes' "Customers for Life" concept," and John Laing Homes' "House to Home" philosophy.
   
8. Manage the New Home Experience by looking for those opportunities to create memories worth repeating. These may include home buying seminars for your customers (more effectively named "Meet Your Neighbors" parties), web site updates of a home's progress for out-of-town buyers, and consistent, predictable communications with your buyers.
   
9. Offer Unique Experiences at Every Touch Point. Key touch points include contract signing, design consultation, final orientation, closing, handing over the keys. Some ideas: take a photo of the buyers at contract signing, hold the closing in their home, put down a red carpet leading to their home on move-in day.
   
10. Orchestrate the Home Buying Experience by replacing random, unplanned events in the home buying process with an established, predictable schedule of meetings with your homebuyers. Be consistent with the notices of the meetings, the way they begin and end (on positive notes), and the materials that are provided.
    
11. Reduce Your Customers' Anxiety by injecting some extraordinary and unexpected touch points, such as giving them a digital camera during a walk-through so they can take pictures or an unannounced call. These small, random acts of kindness show the buyers' you care and give them even more confidence that you will deliver on your promises.
    
12. Prepare for Random Contacts. Customers are likely to call you anytime for a myriad of reasons. Smart builders document those contacts, analyze them, and develop a plan to address these contacts as routine rather than random. Remember: set a standard for addressing them that exceeds the customers' expectation. 

For a copy of the handout Smith and Mirman used for their presentation, send an e-mail to either sferrer@eliant.com or csmithhomeaddress@att.net.

Paul Thompson is the editor of fhba.com.

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