Home builders are selling really well right now
. You might think it is because everyone is now either a certified virtual selling ninja or digital marketing wizard. Leadership has rolled with the punches and charted a course through the chaos for their teams. It is easy to think that builder’s have pulled themselves up by the bootstraps and got to work innovating, changing, and growing. Unfortunately, that’s not true for most of you reading this – and yet I’m still holding out hope that big things are coming soon.
The market is absolutely on fire
. The chart below is from Google Trends for the search “homes for sale.” If you think the spike up is not too impressive looking, then please remember that Google Trends data is not absolute numbers but “numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart for the given region and time. A value of 100 is the peak popularity for the term.” Ladies and gentleman, we’re at the peak – you can’t go past 100.
You don’t trust Google Trends data? I hear you… it isn’t always as helpful as I’d like to think it is either. So, instead let’s look at the data on organic traffic from over 50 home building companies across North America for a real life snapshot of what’s happening. In particular, I want you to pay attention to the last part of the graph and compare it to the data from Google above.
COVID-19 has not been a change agent. Instead, it has acted as an accelerant – speeding along trends already spotted years ago by experts. DoorDash was already here. So was Zoom. Matterport? Uh huh – since 2011. BombBomb video email was founded in 2006. On-demand tours began at least as far back as 2015 with Redfin.
For those builders who woke up and decided to catch back up to the modern world and did so during a pandemic… I salute you. However (insert booming announcer voice), the award goes to… the builders who already had everything in place. They were able to stay focused and execute faster and more consistently because they were built for this.
I mistakenly said on our podcast a while back that innovation has improved dramatically over the last few months – it has actually been mostly about catching up to the 2018 consumer and other builders who truly innovated over the past fifteen years. What would have become of all those companies if the market conditions hadn’t allowed them the luxury of adjusting to the mistake of stagnation? Yikes.
Let’s all be honest with each other. If home builders were restaurants we finally all just started offering take-out. Does that qualify as innovation?
The market is STILL too good to know who is actually the best at… well, everything. Being open for business and “giving it the college try” is good enough to get sales right now in most cities. I’m not saying it is has been easy – and there was a rough 3-4 week period where you had to balance a lot ideas at the same time that were mentally taxing, but I am saying you shouldn’t be overly confident in how far you’ve come just yet.
The creme de la creme market won’t let you or me know for sure that it’s enough. Let’s be honest… if home builder’s were restaurants we finally all just started offering take-out. Does that qualify as innovation? I don’t think it should. I’m glad you started meeting your customer in ways they want to meet you, but most builders – by Do You Convert’s own internal studies – aren’t executing as good on these ideas as leadership thinks they are.
We have closed out on Wave 1 of the challenges that await us, but there will likely end up being (at least) three waves of this for consumers (and marketers):
My encouragement to you is not to get complacent – the marathon is not over. Now the sprint is on for the consumer who wants to take advantage of low rates and “reset” where and how they want to live in their homes based on current events. Wave 2 challenges are already putting builders to the test as consumers scramble to find a home that truly meets their needs or adjust to a work from home lifestyle. Sales teams (online and on-site) are now frequently overwhelmed with leads and prospects to work with. Once again, sorting through them all is becoming job #1 – and our antiquated IT systems and traditional sales person role / model home setup aren’t making our lives any easier.
What has gotten us through 2020 so far has been an incredibly strong market. That shouldn’t impact your feelings about your team’s efforts, but it should help you check your ego at the door and continue to question if how you are doing things now is still the best it can be done. There is also still (hopefully) some time to prepare for the inevitably tough market that will one day come.
I remain hopeful based on many private conversations that a handful of truly innovative companies will do the hard work necessary to keep pulling the industry forward, and I look forward to introducing those leaders and their innovative solutions to you in the months to come. I’ll leave you with the most bad-ass quote during the entire pandemic so far made by Logan Mohtashamiin his column for HousingWire, “our future is so bright that one day we will be trading in our face masks for shades.” I’d only add to it that “this only applies to the innovators. Next time an event like this happens the market may not allow you to play catch up.”
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