Branding The Intangible with Sweet Life & Co.
Erin Jones meets with Sarah Greenberg, owner of Sweet Life & Co. (@sweetlifepalmbeach), on this installment of #peekintoprocess.
Sarah started her own boutique real estate company, and has successfully branded an intangible service - her concierge style real estate agency assists in every detail from contract to close, and even beyond.
Read The Highlights
About the Business
Sarah:
I'm a local area realtor and the founder of a boutique real estate team, which is Sweet Life & Co. We are local area experts helping clients through the buying and selling processes, and we're not your average realtors. We offer a concierge service to our clients, where we help them not only through the process of buying or selling a home. But beyond that, the initial introduction, the process in and of itself, and then relationships are built along the way and it continues, beyond just the transaction.
Erin:
Perfect. All right, well let's get a little bit into the intangible. I want to start with the name of your company. Sweet Life & Co. is not the most normal name that you would expect for a real estate company. What's the meaning behind it?
Sarah:
My overall concept and goal was to give people a little bit of insight into where we live. It's so much more than just a real estate group, it's also introducing people to the sweet life that we live here. It's truly unlike anywhere else I've ever been. It's my hometown, I was born and raised here, and I'm very proud of the everyday beauty of where we live, so my goal was to obviously have a symbol of hospitality with the pineapple and tie into that name, Sweet Life & Co. We live where life is sweet, and there's truly something here for everybody. I felt it was important to focus on the lifestyle that accompanies real estate, not just the real estate.
Erin:
I think in a saturated market the name of your company does good for you. It's true to what your brand is, which is wanting to bottle up the secret sauce of why people live here when they can live in all sorts of different places, but you know they choose to live here and you chose to represent it.
Sarah:
I really think so, it's focusing on this special place where we live. A lot of times people come here, they don't know the area. They're going to go explore south, they're going to explore north, and I have a really special introduction to our area, I take them on a condensed two hour tour, where I pack in things that they wouldn't even know were here. I give them a great area map, we have snacks and drinks since we’ll be in the car. I want them to feel comfortable, I want them to feel excited about this special place and I exude that when I meet them. I am passionate about where we live. I know a lot of special little places so we get to do a tour and if they do go elsewhere and see some other area, almost always they end up coming back.
The Process
Erin:
Let’s talk about the intangibles of real estate, you aren’t really selling a product here. Someone else owns the home, and you’re the vehicle to get there. You’re selling your brand, and the sweet life. When looking at a business model, what do you sell?
Sarah:
What I'm selling is, hopefully, to help a client through the real estate process but more so the product is the relationship, and the feeling that comes along with that. I don't think of my job as a sales job where most people would. It's so much more than that, and clients see that very early on. There is a very deep connection, a very deep understanding that has to take place. I am a matchmaker.
Erin:
Yeah, it’s not always this serendipitous moment where you walk into a house and it’s the house. It’s a journey and a process and it helps to have an experienced person along for the ride. Take me through what what a sales journey looks like from the initial point of contact with a buyer.
Sarah:
Everybody's different, and my approach to every client is tailored to whatever their situation is. I have clients that have little babies and pre-COVID I would offer to hold the baby for them so they could really soak in the specifics of the house and look around and enjoy their tour, things like that. It's a discussion that takes place where I'm more interested in who they are and what interests them. Why Palm Beach Gardens? What was it about this area? What are their goals, what are their wants, what are their interests? I help them navigate and make suggestions appropriately. I connect them to different vendors along the way, and I assure them that at no point in the process are they going to feel confused or overwhelmed, it should be fun.
The Future
Erin:
As you grow, how are you going to pass along the value of the services Sweet Life delivers? You can’t be everywhere at once so how are you able to interface with these clients and continue to provide the value that you built the company on?
Sarah:
I am very grateful and happy that almost 100% of my business now is referral based and I know that the reason that has happened is because of the service I've given. I received some really good advice from a friend. He said “You are extraordinary at what you do and you need to set your goals beyond anything you could ever imagine, because you can do it, but you need to leverage.” So, leveraging out pieces of the business that don't necessarily require my time in terms of, you know, administrative duties and things like that. I've been able to leverage so I can still focus on the client experience and give the client the service that sets me apart from others.
Erin:
Does that service differ when you get a cold lead? A virtual stranger who hasn’t been recommended, how do you convince them to work with you?
Sarah:
There's really no convincing and in my opinion, that’s the goal. I'm just making an introduction, and I'm trying to understand their why. Oftentimes our conversation steers far far away from the home in and of itself, I'm not trying to push anything on anyone. I'm trying to uncover their needs and their wants, I'm trying to pinpoint the specific things that interest them and make a connection and, you know, find a relevant thing and offer a service to them that is beyond the house. So I listen, and if they see something that triggers something I've experienced with another client or something I've experienced living here I'm going to offer that suggestion and continue the conversation so it's more of a natural uncovering of information as we go.
Erin:
So, what’s in the future for Sweet Life & Co.?
Sarah:
The future is pretty much going to remain the same. I mean, we're going to continue offering clients the awesome concierge level service. Relationships are obviously at the forefront of everything that we do. And yeah just fine tuning little things behind the scenes, always learning, building the relationships with people in our area and community, and being that resource for people when the time comes, they have any questions at all, they can come to us and we will take excellent care of them.
A Parting Thought
Erin:
If you could go back to the inception of the brand, is there anything you would have changed or anything that you have learned along the journey of building this brand that would have been really helpful to know?
Sarah:
I think strategy and the feeling that the brand gives is something that I've learned through you. When I launched the initial brand, it was just ensuring the lifestyle of the local area. The color schemes, the photos that we post, the image that we want to present. It’s so much more than that, it's who are you, what is your brand, and what do you want people to know about it? That's the continuous ongoing thing behind the scenes that I'm constantly navigating and making sure that I'm putting across to people.