The Language of Luxury

photo by Shawn Lipowski

Venus de Milo in the Louvre,aka Aphrodite de Milo

Considered One of the Finest Examples of  Classic Greek Sculpture

How important is aesthetics in presenting your luxury real estate marketing services?  The answer is: very important. In fact, aesthetics represents an entire branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste.  The aesthetics of visual presentation can be your “silent salesperson” and play a much bigger part than you may realize in the success of your luxury real estate practice.

There is a whole psychology of color alone; certain colors evoke very predictable emotional responses and personal values judgments of sentiment and taste.  That means you can connect with your target market on a deep emotional level by incorporating the right aesthetics in your personal or company brand.  What are the right aesthetics? The right graphic images are those images that represent your authentic brand.

If you neglect this essential component of brand strategy you are missing an extraordinary opportunity and you are vulnerable to potential competition.  We live in a new online world where you have a nano-second to make a strong first impression and engage your website visitors through the emotional connection of aesthetics. 

Think of walking down Madison Avenue in New York or any major retail street in cosmopolitan cities that feature luxury stores.  Window displays must grab the attention of potential customers or they just walk on by.  Now, think of the speed at which a website visitor, with a single click of their mouse, can move on to your competitor’s site.

So much attention has been paid to driving traffic to your website. You may be spending considerable time and money to get potential buyers and seller there.  But, are you engaging them with the power of aesthetics when they arrive?

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Imagination and creativity is one of the cornerstones of a successful luxury real estate marketing practice. Imitation and luxury really do not belong together. Too often we see luxury real estate professionals copying the branding or marketing strategies of their closest competitors and forgoing the competitive advantage of being original and authentic. It becomes a case of the hot pink plastic flamingo!

One of the most beautiful birds on our planet is the flamingo.  This brightly colored bird caught the imagination of Don Featherstone who designed a plastic hot pink flamingo as a lawn ornament, sold in pairs (one upright the other feeding.) This plastic creation was awarded the “Ig-Nobel Prize for Art (a parody of the Nobel Prize). Plastic pink flamingos have become part of the American pop culture. Original Featherstone’s are marked as such on the bird’s underside.

American Flamingo, Photo by Fritz Geller Grimm

However, copy cats swarmed in and reproduced the flamingos in mass. This caught the imagination of students at the University of Wisconsin who “flamingoed” (the verb) a hill near their campus with over 1000 plastic flamingos on the first day of classes one year. Their prank sparked similar episodes around the country.

Plastic flamingos are now considered in the art world as kitsch. " Kitsch is a German word denoting art that is considered an inferior, tasteless copy of an extant style of art or a worthless imitation of art of recognized value."

Authenticity in personal branding will strike the right chord with your ideal clients.  Phoniness will repel them like plastic pink flamingos. It is not that there isn’t a market for these hollow birds.  It is just a question of knowing who you are and who you want to attract.

Is your personal brand original or is it kitsch?

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Authenticity is perhaps the most important concept in personal branding for luxury real estate marketing professionals. Without authenticity, you live in a masquerade. What is at stake if you forego authenticity? Quite simply, it is your own happiness.

Recently, Andre Agassi published an autobiography in which he admitted to be caught up in a masquerade.  He was forced by his father, who recognized his extraordinary talent, to become a champion in a game that Agassi would come to hate.  In his recent TV interview it was obvious that he suffered a life of quiet desperation during the time when his brand was perceived as being the “rock star of tennis”.  Canon, the camera company, capitalized on his brand image of being a rebel (which was the brand name of one of their models).

Reactions have been mixed from his contemporaries and fans.  Resentments have been expressed by some.  At the root of these resentments is the feeling of having been duped by Agassi’s charade. 

Many people might say that this is a sign of the times. But, there is a deeper lesson to be learned, which is what Agassi, the staunch supporter of education, is now trying to tell the world.  That is, there may be much to gain by living a fake existence, but in the long run it is your own happiness itself that is at stake.

As brand strategists, it is our job to assist our clients to drill down to their core identity, identify what is truly important to them, what they stand for, what their genuine values are, not the values of others. Only then can you make explicit, in the form of a graphic representation and a genuine marketing message, the authentic personal brand. 

We ask our clients what they can do better than anyone else in their marketplace. But, they also must be truly passionate about doing it. An authentic pursuit cannot be one based on seeking the admiration of one’s father or the crowd at large.

It was only when Agassi admitted to himself that he was caught up in a masquerade that he shaved his head and discontinued wearing a wig (his mask).  He chose tennis on his own terms and became passionate about the game.  No one can minimize his extraordinary accomplishments. But, the best accomplishment of all was choosing an authentic life.

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Photo courtesy of Swanepoel Social Media Report 2010

The Titanic shift from traditional media to social media has confounded businesses of every type. Luxury real estate marketing professionals are no exception. With the Do Not Call laws, telemarketing is no longer an option. People are tossing direct mail in the garbage more so now than ever, without even looking at it. The ability to record TV programs and “zip through” commercials while on mute has significantly reduced the effectiveness of advertising on broadcast TV.  Even banner ads are being ignored online. 

All of these major changes pose this important question: How do you effectively reach your targeting market? The answer: You do NOT reach your target market. You allow them to reach to you by being accessible and offering extraordinary value. 

The Social Media Dilemma:  A Plethora of Choices, plus a Scarcity of Time

In the not too distant past we had three basic choices in the US when viewing TV: CBS, NBC and ABC.  With the advent of cable TV, suddenly there were over 500 channels. Today Direct TV has about 130 HD (high definition) channels alone.  Now, with YouTube and the ability for just about anyone to produce and publish video there are literally millions of choices for viewers to watch.

While viewers have a plethora of choices for online entertainment, they ironically have a scarcity of time.  This means that in any given category of entertainment they only can retain a couple of names of websites or other media channels in their minds. The same holds true for any category of product or service. 

The Antidote: Become the Break-Away Brand

The plethora of choices coupled with the scarcity of time poses what we have coined as the primary marketing ultimatum: Stand Out or Bow Out!™ If you do not stand out, and occupy the top of mind location on a short very short list of brands in a specific category, you might as well settle for crumbs at best when it comes to market share. 

Here is an example of how this works.  What is the first adhesive cellophane tape that comes to your mind? Can you think of another brand in this category?  Do you have time to research more brands? 3M’s Scotch Tape is the “category killer” in cellophane tape category.  To become the category killer you must become the bread-away brand.

To stand out and become the break-away brand, as a luxury real estate marketing professional, you need to select an uncontested category or niche in your marketplace that you can dominate with passion by offering extraordinary value, better than anyone else. That is how you get your target market to reach to you and recommend you to their friends. Being remarkable in a specific category triggers word-of-mouth advertising or buzz which can be amplified through traditional media and also spread virally through social media.

Take the antidote to the social media dilemna or settle for crumbs. Stand Out or Bow Out!

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Photo of Gold Crystal

Luxury real estate agents have been hearing, for a couple years, that they need to blog.  They have been promised that Google will magically send traffic to their sites if they just spew “content”.  Never mind that the content that they are writing about or the stories they are reporting are of any interest to a target market. Forget the idea of original content.  After mindlessly regurgitating other people’s information, most agents abandon their blogs within 60 days concluding that it was a waste of time and was of little value in terms of generating immediate leads, let alone transactions.

What an awesome tool the blog is for those who have discovered their unique “golden” voice, a voice that is “follow-worthy”!  Blogs offers anyone the opportunity to become a syndicated columnist because followers can subscribe to their “column”, keep up on the latest installments and also engage in discussion with the author and other followers. Plus, it is virtually free!  So, is the help you can get from your silent marketing partner, Google.  Google wants to help create a perfect match between you and your potential audience, your ideal potential clients because they sell more ads when users experience better search results.  

 Right now, there is an abundance of unexploited marketing niches right under your nose, where you can become the undisputed market leader.  But, you will not perceive these untapped “gold mines” if you do not know your own mind. You first need to discover your own golden voice.  

 Follow us on Part 3 of Go for the Gold!  We will cover specifics methods for discovering your unique golden voice.

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While most luxury real estate marketing professionals are still reeling from the downturn in the market and working harder than ever just to keep up, some are seeing the enormous opportunity that the new era of the internet has to offer and they are starting to reach for the gold ring.  Yes, there is a gold rush out there. But, what may not be obvious is what the new gold looks like and how to find it.

The new gold is all about identifying an uncontested niche in your marketplace where you can add extraordinary value; then staking your claim to ownership of that new market space. It is about cashing in on who you are, what you are most passionate about and leveraging the new media tools to reach and connect with your ideal clients in a focused manner.

What is the catch?  You need to know who you are, what you stand for, what you are passionate about what you can do better than anyone else in your marketplace.  You need to discover you unique voice. Only then will the new media tools make any sense to you in terms of their potential to tap the gold reserve that awaits you.  The tools are meaningless otherwise.  Only when you become “follow-worthy” will you attract and retain your audience, and also convert that audience into cash flow.

The opportunities for cashing in on your passion have never been more abundant than right now because of the new media tools. Read Part 2 of this series called, Go for the Gold!  for more details about how to discover your unique voice and how to become follow worthy.

Check Out Personal Branding Case Studies and Company Branding Case Studies

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