Those who have studied even a bit of marketing are aware of the 4P's of marketing mix, but for those who have not heard about it let me write it here for them; P-Product, P-Price, P-Place, P-Promotion. After 4P's the Marketing Gurus realized that they need to add few more P's to it, so they added P-People, P-Process, P-Physical Existence then they added P-Packaging as the 8th P and P-Payment as the 9th P in the marketing mix.
I request all the readers to not get into the trap of the number of P's in the marketing mix, but essentially I would like to propose to marketers to look at P-Process as the first P in the marketing mix especially if we are dealing with an unorganized sector like Real Estate. Real Estate is one such product which can't be touched and felt before it is constructed and delivered to its customers. The general trend in the market to sell real estate property is when it is in the under-construction stage and the customer makes a buying decision basis whatever information is provided by the developer to the customer in the form of pictures, videos, graphics etc. In customer's opinion this sector required a lot of regulatory measures to be taken and the good thing that happened to us is RERA (Real Estate Regulatory Authority of India), who is taking actions due to which work has already started in the direction of making it an organized sector.
Well, I am not sure how much sense this article will make to everyone but if you look at it from the perspective of thousands of developers who are having projects at smaller scale they need to also follow a particular Process. In the current market scenario there are very few developers who are process oriented and the idea of writing this article is to make marketers think, "how we can ensure that the maximum number of developers is driven by the Process?"
What is this Process we are really talking about?
If we look at the Real Estate sector then there are ample of things that are to be taken care of before a developer even reaches at the product stage. Before RERA, developers would directly start to sell their project to customers without having all legal permissions in place. Post RERA, it is mandatory for all developers to first register their project under RERA and once the developer has been issued RERA ID number then they can officially start marketing their project in the market. This is really a very productive move to start the project registration Process by the Government of India and it is not as easy to implement as it looks from the outside.
Now, let us draw our attention to what happens to the Process after developer gets his project registered under RERA. Developer does everything to get his project registered with RERA and once he receive his RERA ID he starts marketing the project in the market. Now here starts the real issue, because every developer is different so is their marketing Process. In the case of Real Estate sector a marketer’s job is not to just think about a good selling strategy to boost sales, but a marketer has to find a balance with all the other departments in the value chain.
Especially, if customer is buying a property in an under-construction stage, then at this stage the customer is getting onboard with the developer and starting a journey towards finally getting his dream home at a future promised date. During this journey a lot of things may not exactly work as it may be planned, so it is very important for marketers to understand the Process to provide better buying experience to the customers. In order to streamline the entire buying Process, marketers need to keep a complete control on the entire business cycle, right from the time the Product marketing starts, prospect customers making inquiries, field sales force going into the market, selection of inventory and its management, customer paying token amount, loan department, customer being handed over to the CRM or post sales team, customers documentation, property registration, accounts department, brokerage payouts, engineering department, purchase department to the time when the customer is finally taking the possession of his property.
Buying home is once in a lifetime decision for most of the customers and being responsible marketers it is our responsibility to ensure that we create an amazing journey for our customers and leave them with an experience where they feel safe and secure. Barring a few 100 to 200 odd names across the country there would be very few developers who are committed to provide their customers a pleasant buying experience. Please don't get me wrong here, I am not trying to blame anyone, but I think it is because of lack of awareness or may be also lack of skilled marketers who fail to understand the Process and focus only on one aspect of the business i.e. generating sales.
There are developers whose names are not known to us but they are Process oriented and have willingness to do so. One must note that in most of the cases marketers are employees and without willingness from the developers themselves nothing would change. It will require both the developer and the marketer to arrive at a common ground where both agree to become Process oriented. By being Process oriented there is a huge possibility that all the stakeholders involved in the business will be able to create better value in the market, it will also help them to build trust. One of the best examples I can think of in the unorganized sector is the fast food business. There was a time when it use to be completely unorganized and no one even considered thinking about Process, but then came Mc'Donalds who developed a Process and the same got followed by thousand more brands.
How to ensure that brokerages are released in time to Channel Partners?
As a developer let us consider you are wanting to implement timely brokerage payout as a Process, and say currently you are unable to pay brokerages in time due to cash flow issues. Now, the first thing you or your marketer needs to do is give proper instructions to all the departments involved in the entire property selling Process. Your sourcing team and closing team must be instructed clearly to mention the Brokerage amount separately in the Cost Sheet while emailing it to the CRM, accounts and team responsible for registration of properties. The accounts department must be clearly instructed that at every given point in time they must treat the Brokerage amount as a liability to be paid to the Channel Partner involved in the sale of property. Your registration and CRM team must be informed to handover a PDC cheque to your CP on the date of registration of property by the customer and the same can be cleared within 10 working days from the date of first disbursement of home loan by the bank. The Channel Partner can submit his Brokerage invoice on the date of registration itself, this will ensure that your accounts department gets time to manage the accounting Process.
The positive impact of implementing this Process could be that you are not only managing your cash flows but at the same time your Channel Partners will also have enough liquidity to spend in further marketing of your project thus ensuring more business. Channel Partners will also feel very comfortable working with you.
How to deal with customers who ask for refund against cancellation of property?
Cancellation of property can be a very painful situation for any developer as customers generally doesn't expect to incur any losses. The CRM, accounts and sales team has to undergo a lot of stress as they have to make the customer understand that they won't get 100% refund of their booking amount. Even though developers include their refund policy in their booking forms, still the CRM, accounts and sales teams have to face this issue. Firstly, as a marketer you must always know this, that a customer who is buying a property from his hard earned money may re-think about his decision even after paying the booking amount. I really like the way Indian railways handle their refund policy (penalty for opportunity lost), similarly we can adopt the same policy in Real Estate i.e. you can make your customer to sign a one pager refund policy where the customer if chooses to cancel the booking within 7 Days (x% Deduction) , 15 Days (y% Deduction), maximum up to 30 Days (z% Deduction), and if he cancels post 30 Days from date of booking then (a% Deduction) will be done from the booking amount. It is very important that refund policy is clearly discussed with your customer at the time of booking itself to avoid future conflicts, as it affects the brand a lot and creates negativity in customers mind for no reason.
In case you have any questions related to Process please feel free to contact me - Aamitesh A Mukherjee - 9833954332
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