How to Profile Your Ideal Client in Commercial Real Estate Brokerage

Understand your commercial real estate client choices and your property market.  Make sure you are focusing your services into the prospects and clients that can offer you the ongoing leads, listings, and reasonable commissions that you require over time.  Brokerage success is achieved through a process of focus and action; clients are part of that.

So why do this?  It is a bit like formulating a ‘VIP’ group of clients in your real estate business.  When you focus your attention on certain clients and properties, the listings and commissions get a bit easier.  Your marketing processes are more refined as are the services that you offer.

Set Your Client Targets

To get things started with this, you profile your ideal account for your location and skills, and then you connect with them in ongoing ways.  Relevance and contact frequency is important in building a client list.

It is interesting to remember that when you approach your ideal clients and prospects in this way, it is always easier to convert listings.  Let’s get things started here.  Make choices with your client types and properties with due regard to these things:

1. Location – set boundaries for your primary property market, and stay within those boundaries. If any leads or new business comes to you outside of the zone then you have choices as to whether you have the time and or the knowledge to handle that listing.  Protect your time, and don’t service listings that are too far away.
2. Portfolio – some clients have portfolios of properties and on that basis, they will need plenty of help with sales, leasing management over time. Connect with those clients that have complex and ongoing property needs.
3. Property type – given the local property transactions in any given year, the property types and the locations are setting indicators and benchmarks in any sale or lease. Specialize into a property type as it will make it easier for you to talk about supply, demand, prices and rents.
4. Services needed and frequency of activity – some clients are busier than others with property changes, challenges, and upgrades. Work with clients that really need your help over time with many different issues.
5. Value of property portfolio – the larger properties are more valuable in most cases. It directly follows that the transactions will be bigger and offer you more potential commissions.  It is easier to build a good business profile as an agent or broker when you transact the larger and well-known properties in any town or city.  Refine your prospecting and marketing activities accordingly.
6. Repeat and referral business – judge your clients on an index of repeat or referral business. Those clients that can offer you good levels of repeat business and or referrals are the clients to work with closely.  Connect with the frequently and directly.  Get to know what they need help within their portfolio before they get to the next challenge or change. Focus on factors of change such as tenant mix, income, redevelopment, disposal, acquisition, and asset performance.

So, you can profile your ideal commercial property client in this way.  The rules are simple and yet effective.  When you profile your ideal client, your listing focus and prospecting processes get a lot easier.