Consumer Reports has released a survey that shows that the national RE companies have successfully wrung every drop of meaning out of their so-called brands.
I haven’t had a chance to read the report, but there is enough on Inman today to get the gist:
- Even though Indie agents were said to offer fewer services, “…sellers who used them were just as satisfied” as the sellers who used name-brand agents.
- Customer satisfaction scores for Real Estate companies ranged from 79 to 81. A 3 point spread. Homogenization complete.
Translation: Sellers don’t mind when an indie agent fails to show up with a folder full of Home Warranties, and they don’t care which logo adorns the business cards of the brand-name agents who do.
I am looking out my window at a Hostess delivery truck with a picture of a split-open chocolate cup cake next to the Hostess logo. I want one. I want to peel the frosting off, set it aside, eat the decapitated cupcake and chase it with the frosting just like I did when I was 10. I have an emotional attachment to Hostess Cupcakes that started the day my Mom brought home a box from the supermarket, and its been reinforced every time I have had two (you have to have two) ever since.
Every time I open that cupcake wrapper, I know what I am going to get: The plastic peels off of the frosting even (usually) if the package is warm and they taste *exactly* the same every time, even if they have been sitting on a shelf for six years. Mom brought home cheap, store brand chocolate cupcakes once….Once.
That’s how branding is supposed to work. The ad man Jerry Bulmore said that “Consumers build an image [of a brand] as birds build nests. From the scraps and straws they chance upon.” Bulmore’s sticks and straws are interactions, and what he left out is that the strongest nests are built when the building materials are consistent.
Branding a service is inherently difficult. Unlike cupcakes, its a lot harder to control the quality of the end product, and something as fragile as the emotional Read more