Winkworth wins Website of the Year

Congratulations to Winkworth - winners of the Negotiator Website of the Year.  Especially to Wilfred Tienzo, their head of technology, everyone else at Winkworth and at Homeflow, their web designers.

And what did the Judges say?

“A new website designed to give visitors a better experience, to be more responsive and, crucially, generate more leads. It works!”

Here's our contribution - and see it live here.

Feeding through to this in search...

• 'Reviews from the web' - centre right in the Google knowledge panel and right under their organic listing
• Star rating and score from their own reviews under their organic listing
• Google reviews - every person who writes a review to their website is invited to post a  review to Google
• Google rich snippets - the three influential quotes under reviews at the bottom of the Google knowledge panel

...in turn making them look like this in local search...

...reinforcing the message - 'We are good at what we do, not because we say so, but because our clients say so' time after time, backing up all their other marketing efforts.

Well done Winkworth!

the 'Negotiator' Conference - a briefing

Some 500 of Britain’s top agents met yesterday at The Negotiator Conference. Branding, marketing and social media were the subjects of three of the discussion forums and HelpHound was there to meet with our clients and so we could brief those of you who were unable to attend.

Branding 



Giles Redmayne, Business Director at Purpose, was refreshingly honest in his analysis of estate agents’ online presence. Commenting on the ‘general tendency to overuse adjectives’ (‘passion, integrity, professionalism’) Redmayne remarked ‘You guys all use the same type of language on all of your websites - if you claim it you have to prove it.’

He acknowledged that ‘there’s a recession’ (‘I run a business too,’ he said) but argued that ‘establishing your brand and reputation, which need not be expensive, is the best way of surviving any downturn and emerging from it stronger.

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Marketing

Ian Laverty, an expert in marketing and business development, agreed with Redmayne’s comments on the ‘striking similarity of estate agents’ websites. He advised those attending to ‘start doing things that highlight how you are different and better’ (‘Don’t claim to be unique’ he added) and to ‘make sure whatever you do ‘is credible.’ 

Social media

Streetsmart’s Tracy Wood’s social media segment focused on ‘engaging with your clients, satisfied or not.’ Her message was a powerful one: ‘If you take your business seriously and want to be around in five years time you must engage with your clients.’

HelpHound was delighted to hear Wood speak about ‘the need for structured and planned communication with clients’ and she stressed how a 'complainer with an issue resolved can be transformed into a valuable client.' ‘You need a means of settling issues through the web, but offline; public spats are never good’ she concluded. 

Clients will be reassured that HelpHound's Dialogue™ ticks all the boxes highlighted by the issues raised in these presentations

If you would like a more detailed briefing on any of this, please contact Freddie Manson at HelpHound or your business membership advisor.