Jones Robinson

The client

Jones Robinson is the leading independent estate agent in our local area. It has regional branches covering West Berkshire, Oxfordshire and North Hampshire, and it sells more homes in the area than any other estate agent. More than 90% of Jones Robinson’s property sales are successful, making it three times better than the average estate agent in achieving sales that proceed to completion.

Their needs

Being the market leader is one thing; maintaining that advantage is another, particularly in a small town with a lot of other agents. “We knew that staying on top would take more than the traditional estate agent’s marketing mix of door-drop leaflets and property ads in the local paper,” says Charles Robinson, director of Jones Robinson. “There are few barriers to stop new entrants coming in to the market, and the result is intense pressure on market share and profitability.” They decided to embark on a marketing research project to establish the most effective ways to engage their audiences.

What we did

We analysed Jones Robinson’s marketing research to make sense of their customers’ attitudes, examined their sales process and looked at the position of their competitors in the local market. Using this information, we helped Jones Robinson to formulate a marketing strategy and a plan that would make the most of its strengths, address its weaknesses, and in doing so maintain its strong position in the local market.

We identified an opportunity to build stronger and longer term relationships with Jones Robinson’s customers. Our main tool for achieving this has been Talking Property, a free email newsletter that offers advice on moving home and enhancing property and provides updates on the state of the market. We customise each issue to make it relevant to the needs of different customers in each of the branches.

We use other promotional tools to deliver a consistent set of messages, coordinating the editorial calendar for the newsletter with our schedule for Jones Robinson’s media relations, and integrating this with advertising in regional publications. We also organised a local property event to help local homeowners make the most of their properties.

Working with our partner MAXX Design, we have also developed websites, brochures, case studies and other sales collateral for each of the four regional branches.

The results

“We are very pleased with the results,” says Charles. “In a difficult market, Resonates has helped us to grow our market share.”
 
“When we started Jones Robinson 10 years ago, we were able to differentiate ourselves using colour advertising in the local media. Now we are differentiating ourselves once again using a broader range of media to communicate with our customers.”

“We now have a very clear idea of how to engage our audiences. Resonates is delivering an integrated approach, communicating a set of common messages consistently across carefully selected media, and the results speak for themselves. After just four months, the newsletter is beating the industry average open rates and clickthrough rates by a significant margin. We have also secured coverage in national estate agency titles, and have been approached by customers as a direct result of PR coverage in the local newspaper.”

Our view

By integrating PR and direct customer communications we are able to deliver affordable and professional marketing communications services that allow Jones Robinson to differentiate from the rest of the pack. Getting the messages right at the outset is critical to the success of any campaign. 

Visit the Jones Robinson website

 

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