Marks & Mann Increasing Business From a new Interactive Website
Marks & Mann Estate Agents are an East Anglia based independent estate agents who have breathed fresh air into the market with outstanding customer service and listing nearly three time the amount of properties as any other local estate agent.
Before
We had been working with Marks & Mann curating their old legacy website and performing SEO on it. The old site used to have good visitor stats but not many direct enquires came specifically from it. Another major problem was the code that the previous web development company had used. Although the site was written in WordPress, something we love the past developers had altered so much that the site didn’t follow the normal and much loved logic of WordPress. This meant even simple changes were difficult to deliver.
It was clear a fresh, modern website which showed off Marks & Mann’s unique style was needed. This was because the old site didn’t fit the prominent yet friendly image the business had.
A key performance indicator for us on the new site was that it should not only increase the number of visitors but to increase the number of valuation and viewing requests. We started the project with a ‘stock take’ of what tools Marks & Mann use and if there was a way we could integrate them into the site to cut down on admin functions. This centred around their practice management system which they wanted to integrate into the new website to automatically list properties and show their details.
We knew that if we could deliver a new website which looked good, allowed for fast turnaround of new content, saved admin time and increased customer interaction we would have delivered the perfect site for Marks & Mann.
During
We spent some time looking at other estate agent’s websites mostly in London to get a feeling for what Marks & Mann were looking for. Armed with this information we set about creating a design brief.
Whilst the design element of the project was under way we spent some time working with the developers of their practice management software to look at how we would integrate their software into the new website. Although the developer had a tool set for us to use we felt that it would not be enough for what Marks & Mann wanted the site to do. As a result we developed our own tool set based on their basic version which integrated better with their 3rd party software.
When we build a new website we allowed the client early access to the development site so they can see the design as it grew. This meant that in our weekly project meetings we were able to quickly change or modify to meet their needs.
The project was finished ahead of schedule and on budget.
After
Marks & Mann Estate Agents are busy people, so it was important to wrap the website in a series of services that means the client can ‘fire and forget’ requests to us leaving them to get on with what they do well. To that end we manage all content, maintenance and SEO for them.
During our monthly marketing meetings we discuss site performance and have been able to demonstrate increased traffic, enquiries and search rankings. We have also saved on internal admin time by automating property listings and enquiry processing.
Our partnership with Marks & Mann Estate Agents means that we allow them to stay agile and when they need fresh and new content we are able to respond quickly and efficiently to create new content. An example of this is The Hollies new development where a quick turn around on creating the web content allowed Marks & Mann to quickly reserve over 80% of the properties in super fast time.
“We love the site and love the fact that it has now paid for itself in increased interest and business”. Alan Mann Executive Partner commented. “We have a website that puts national estate agents to shame in both design and functionality, more importantly our customers now find it easier and quicker to contact us and find what they are looking for on the website. We love it!”
We know Marks & Mann have a great tool and we enjoy working with them on this project. The site is producing incredible numbers of visitors keeping our client firmly at the forefront of Ipswich’s Estate Agents.
