How to Remove ‘What’s Your Price-Per-Square-Foot’ from Your Buyer’s Vocabulary (and 3 Other Value Creating Strategies)

On Thursday October 23rd Rick Storlie of New Home Sales Coach will be kicking off a 3 part webinar series leading up to his presentation, “5 Custom Builder Sales Strategies Revealed” at the 2013 International Builders Show in Las Vegas.

Jeremy Skogquist of NIH Homes in Minneapolis, MN used to hear it all the time. “I’d probably get the ‘what’s your price-per-square-foot,’ question from prospective buyers at least once a month,” Skogquist recently commented.

According to Rick Storlie of New Home Sales Coach, a new home sales training firm that specializes helping home builders and remodelers reach their sales goals, Skogquist isn’t alone.

“Builder’s margins took a real beating over the last 6 years. If they didn’t go out of business, they cut margins to the point of just being able to survive. Now that we’re seeing stabilization in some local markets, home and remodeling buyers are reluctant to let builders raise prices,” Storlie said recently.

Storlie has partnered with home builders and remodelers around the country in an effort to redefine home builder marketing. A large portion of time has been to help builders differentiate from their competitors so they can improve margins.

“We’re in an industry where 95 – 99% of all competitors do virtually the same thing. When a prospective buyer can’t tell the difference between two builders, price is the default metric,” Storlie commented.

NIH Homes was one of Storlie’s first clients to undertake the process of shifting from a traditional “sticks and bricks” builder into one fully leveraging today’s technology. The process has 5 components.

1) Online lead generation
2) Automated value creation
3) Targeted engagement based on online activity
4) Customer-centric sales plan
5) Continuous process improvement

When Storlie first started working with NIH Homes he helped them create a Marketing Message and Positioning Statement that resonated with today’s new home buyers.

“We we’re just like every other home buyer. Constantly bidding and hoping we were the lowest bidder. Growth was flat and we felt like we weren’t in control of our destiny,” Skogquist said. “Today we’re relevant and have a large following of future buyers. From 2006 – 2009 we doubled our volume to 10 million annually and maintained margins. In 2012 we’re set to close nearly 13 million and have improved margins. 2013 looks even better.”

Skogquist says they were able to grow while other builders were going out of business by systematizing their process of creating value. They noticed that prospective online buyers were earlier in the process of selecting a home builder than those who were already walking into model homes. That gave NIH Homes time to educate and build a relationship with them. When they did finally come into the marketplace, NIH Homes had the edge over their competitors and were able to make the sale.

Storlie has documented the NIH Homes story along with another client, Sanctuary Homes of Louisville. They will be sharing the results of their transformation in January 2013 at the International Builders Show (IBS) in Las Vegas.

In the months leading up to IBS, Storlie will hold a series of 3 webinars to go into more detail than time allows at the live Las Vegas venue. All the information presented will help home builder sales.

On Thursday October 18th Storlie will be breaking down the 3 primary strategies they’re using to create value.

What: How to Remove ‘What’s Your Price-Per-Square-Foot’ from Your Buyer’s Vocabulary (and 3 Other Value Creating Strategies) (webinar)

When: Thursday, October 18, 2012 at 11 PST, 12 MST, 1 CST, 2 EST

Register: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/521297170

Cost: $0 but limited to 100 attendees

Storlie has created a sales and marketing Scorecard that will tell any home builder or remodeler how well they’re tapping into technology. The Scorecard takes 2 minutes, builders will get an immediate score and see how they compare to their builder peers. Home builders can get their Home Builder Marketing Scorecard by clicking here. Remodelers can get their Remodeler Marketing Scorecard by clicking here.

About Rick Storlie: Rick Storlie of New Home Sales Coach has been helping home builders and remodelers reach their sales goals since 1992. Visit NHSalesCoach.com to access Rick’s free Sales and Marketing Tutorial Library full of tips from generating new leads, Realtor strategies, sales techniques and sales management secrets. Storlie can be reached at 952-895-5566 or Solutions@NHSalesCoach.com.