What Listing Agents Should Do for Sellers

Hey Rona,
You only touched on the basics of what a good listing agent does.
Good listing agents market your property of which advertising is one part of it. Before you promote the property you need to decide what kind of buyer is most likely going to buy this property and then build your marketing plan to attract that type of buyer. A comprehensive marketing plan should have these elements in it:
1. A Competitive Market Analysis to position the property properly.
2. Determine beforehand the best type of financing for the property so the property conforms to that financing.
3.Home Enhancement and Staging
4.Estimated Proceeds the seller will expect from the sale.
5.Determine the "Salability Potential" of a property by preparing a salability checklist
6.Enter the listing in the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) and then have it upload to Realtor.com with an enhanced listing and upload to all the other sites linked to the MLS like Boston.com
7.Prepare Property Information Flyers
8.Put up a yard sign and directional signs
9.Internet exposure
10.Just listed postcards to appropriate people and target areas where your target buyer is living.
11.Office/Broker Promotion
12. Open Houses
13.Local Advertising
14.Progress Reports
15. Review and assist negotiating the purchase offer
16. Relocation Assistance
17. Provide a Sales Guarantee and Easy Out Pledge

Rona,

Great post! An increasingly common issue for sellers' agents in all communities these days is managing the information that is distributed to third-party web services. So many sites like Trulia.com and Zillow.com have relationships with "internet data exchange" services which "pull" information from the MLS. These sites often give opinions on value and allow for unregistered commentary. It is critical that listing agents know who has access to that information and how it is distributed. Other methods of home exposure include Broker "Tours" and networking functions to share information about the newest and strongest properties. Even with the Boston area inventory being at record low numbers there is still a significant amount of property out there that needs to be sifted through.

Rona,

Great advice. I highly agree with offering expert staging advice to your clients. An easy way to do this, if you don't have the knack for that yourself, is to have your own professional stager on call for you. This is a service that I offer to many realtors - as a free service they offer to all their clients, I will conduct a thorough home staging consultation with a written report of things they can do to enhance their property before it's put on the market.