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The end of the year is almost here, and that means it’s time once again to predict what’s in store for the year ahead. For many of our clients, the market shows no signs of stopping before Christmas. After two extremely strong years, everyone will be watching closely to see how it performs in 2015.

So with that in mind, here’s what we think is in store over the next 12 months.

Brand ‘refreshes’

A couple of agencies did full-scale rebrands in 2014. Rebranding brings significant gains, with one inner-city agency regaining its pinnacle position in the market after a major overhaul. But what we saw a lot more of were brand ‘refreshes’. In 2014, several high-profile agencies were keen to tweak and freshen their brands to generate more cut through in the marketplace. In particular, agents are keen to move away from cliched real estate marketing. We see this continuing next year; agencies who didn’t touch their branding in 2014 will be keen to get in on the action when they see the updates their competitors are making.

Chinese marketing material 

New Litho started offering Chinese brochures for international buyers this year and they’ve quickly become indispensable to clients, particularly those based in the sought-after eastern suburbs. With so many international buyers in the market, specifically targeted marketing materials are an invaluable tool for agents. It’s also beginning to change the way some of our clients write listings – Chinese buyers are far more interested in lifestyle factors than a standard list of features, and responsive agencies are tailoring listings to provide the information they seek. It’s even changing the way English language listings are written. We’ve also got some clients tossing around the possibility of adding information on Feng Shui to their Chinese brochures. More agents will jump on the bandwagon next year. 

REA vs everyone

A huge mid-year change to the realestate.com.au pricing structure infuriated agents across Australia, forcing the portal to quickly rethink its approach and simplfy the new pricing model. Agents attempted to bring this behemoth down with a group buying strategy, which ended up being ineffectual. However, expect to see further challenges from fed-up agents – this is shaping up as a drawn out war over the next few years with many small battles and wins for both sides.  It’s too early to call who the eventual winner will be, but it’s going to be fascinating to watch the two sides slug it out. 

Embracing embellishments

This year, we were besieged by clients keen to push the boundaries of printed material. Foiling, magnets, embossing, high quality papers, premium content, high-end design – we’ve noticed a real desire to differentiate and make brands stand out. Agents and business owners are not only increasingly willing to try new things, they’re happy to spend extra money to ensure their brand makes a real impact in the marketplace. Interestingly, it’s mid-tier brands who are setting the standard here – we’re expecting to see more of it filter up to the top end market.

Blinged out brochures

We wrote about this on the blog recently: the humble brochure underwent something of a reinvention in 2014. Unique, one-off designs and high-end finishes have been getting a reaction from vendors and buyers at opens. More and more agents are seeing the value in premium brochures, especially for the prestige market. We expect that to continue in 2015. 

Custom content

Content is becoming a bigger and bigger part of agency marketing strategies. More and more agencies, particularly the top brands, are looking to position themselves as thought leaders with SEO-optimised blog posts, social media strategies, and premium content for newsletters, magazines and other marketing pieces. Great content really elevates a brand in the eyes of vendors and buyers, and agencies will continue to explore the possibilities next year. 

Property Management takes centre stage

PM marketing material often gets ignored until the market turns, but not in 2014. We were pleasantly surprised by the small but significant number of our clients who made huge strides towards improving the quality of their leasing material, with property management pre-lists getting the same careful attention as sales kits, dedicated rentals newsletters, professional photography for rental listings, and snappy staff profiles. In 2015, more and more agencies will focus on building the rentals side of their business into a polished, highly professional entity in its own right. 

Multi-channel marketing

This has been around for a while, but we get the sense multi-channel marketing is on the verge on an explosion in popularity. One of our clients recently produced a DL card that linked to a website where customers could download an information pack or request a printed book. We think more agencies will be testing the waters in the months to come.

Mobile goes mainstream

A massive chunk of online browsing is now happening on mobile, and 2014 officially marked the tipping point where those who hadn’t optimised their online offerings for smartphones began getting left behind. Expect to see a few business playing mobile catch-up in 2015.

The dangers of online reviews

Over the last few months, we’ve noticed a small movement to towards disgruntled buyers and tenants venting online. There’s RealAS – a site that uses its own algorithm to predict sales prices. It then compares that to the agent’s valuation and the actual sale price, and calls out underquoting where it believes it exists. Then there’s the Tenants Union of Victoria, which recently attempted to crowdsource funding for a platform where tenants could rate landlords, property managers, and the quality of rental properties. RealAS is in its infancy and the Tenants Union barely made a dent in it’s $30,000 goal before the deadline expired, but the danger posed by negative online reviews is real, difficult to control and near-impossible to undo. Savvy businesses will develop action plans to ensure prompt responses to any online fallout.

Goodbye QR codes, hello augmented reality

The much-maligned QR code finally limped into oblivion in 2014, with many clients quietly removing them from signboards and newspaper promotions. In its place, tech savvy agents are embracing augmented reality, where a whole page becomes scannable so that smartphone users can access videos, images, additional information and other content related to a property. Expect to see more agents experimenting with the possibilities the technology offers – although it remains to be seen if it can take off in a way that QR codes failed to.

What are your real estate predictions for 2015?