238 Got an Online Sales Counselor? - Rachel Starratt Oct 9 2024

Greg Bray: [00:00:00] Hello everybody, and welcome to today's episode of The Home Builder Digital Marketing Podcast. I'm Greg Bray with Blue Tangerine.

Kevin Weitzel: And I'm Kevin Weitzel with OutHouse.

Greg Bray: And we are excited to have joining us today, Rachel Starratt. Rachel is the Online Sales and Marketing Manager at Red Door Homes. Welcome, Rachel. Thanks for being with us today.

Rachel Starratt: Thank you so much for having me. Glad to be here.

Greg Bray: Well, let's start out Rachel and just tell us a little bit about yourself and help people get to know a little bit about your background.

Rachel Starratt: Okay. So, as you said, my name is Rachel Starratt and I work [00:01:00] for Red Door Homes of the Carolinas. We're a build on your lot builder and we've got four divisions across North and South Carolina. I live in North Carolina currently. I have two little boys, four and two, one of which is special needs. That's me in a nutshell. I love travel. I recently started surfing. That's me.

Kevin Weitzel: Well, normally we get into the, tell us something interesting about yourself, but you did unpack just that tiny little bit of surfing. But do our listeners a favor and tell us something interesting about yourself that has nothing to do with work, has nothing to do with the home building industry, and in this case, nothing to do with family. Let's go ahead and eliminate that one too so we get some newness outside of the surfing and the two kids.

Rachel Starratt: Well, the surfing is a pretty big one to be my age learning to surf, but I will give you something else. So, I actually am originally from Canada, and I actually lived in Italy as well for a few years.

Kevin Weitzel: Where in Italy?

Rachel Starratt: In Vicenza, which is about 45 minutes from Venice.

Kevin Weitzel: Yeah, Vicenza's [00:02:00] great. They have a tire manufacturing plant there for bicycles, just so you know. Vittoria.

Greg Bray: Most people don't know where all the bicycle tire manufacturers places are.

Kevin Weitzel: I know where a lot of bicycle stuff comes from, Greg. Yes, that is a weird thing. I love knowing where things are manufactured and made, so.

Greg Bray: Well, Rachel, tell us a little more about how you got into the home building industry and kind of decided on this career path.

Rachel Starratt: So, I took a position with Red Door Back in 2017 in online sales, and I really loved it from there. So, I started the online sales division within the company as the sole OSC, which I think we'll talk a little bit about as well. And then, the company grew from one division to four and my team grew.

I began then managing the team, moved on through marketing. I've worked in customer experience in the organization. So, I've had my hand in a lot of different areas and pots within the company, but mainly focus on online sales, leadership, and marketing. So, [00:03:00] it's been a really great journey.

I also worked with, Do You Convert as an online sales coach last year. Incredible experience. Through that, really learned about myself that I really wanted to be kind of in the weeds. I wanted to be tackling the problems. I really like to find solutions and really miss that being able to have accomplishments. And so, returned back to my original home of Red Door Homes, and now I'm doing just that.

Greg Bray: Well, before we go any further, let's get a little bit more background on Red Door Homes specifically, and a little more about where you guys build the type of buyer that you're trying to serve and work with.

Rachel Starratt: Yeah, absolutely. So, we build in the greater Raleigh, Fayetteville, Greenville, North Carolina, and then Florence, South Carolina. So, about a 50-mile radius or so from each of those four locations. And as I said, we are build on your lot and we really serve more of the affordability market. So, we have floor plans that start at [00:04:00] 89,990, believe it or not.

Our target market really is more folksy type people. So, blue collar, a lot of first time home builders, a lot of people maybe who grew up in a double-wide or single-wide and never envisioned that stick built home ownership was something that would be possible for them. Affordability is definitely something that we're really passionate about and excited to be in that space.

Kevin Weitzel: That's commendable. With all the different product lines that everybody chases, everybody wants to be a luxury home builder. Who doesn't want to put marble countertops everywhere and cherry wood cabinetry and super duper high polish floors? But the fact that you guys are targeting going after that affordability market, especially in a market where people are literally being flushed out of the availability of being able to even afford a home.

Rachel Starratt: We're really well positioned I would say, I mean, we've been in that market. That's always been our bread and butter and what we're striving towards, but now more so than ever, I would say we are really well positioned moving [00:05:00] forward.

Greg Bray: Do you find that being so specific to being only an on your lot builder is a benefit in your marketing, or is it something that you have to spend a lot of time explaining to prospective buyers who may not kind of understand that model?

Rachel Starratt: Yeah, that definitely is a large part of it, especially in the online sales side of things and marketing. Most people, when they reach out to us, really don't have any idea of what's involved in land development and permitting. And there are a lot of nuances that take a lot of strategy in how you educate and the ways that you educate.

So, that definitely can be a struggle, but I think being only on your lot really benefits us in a lot of ways. It's a hard business to be in and focusing on it really allows us to be the experts in that field. I know a lot of builders when they try and do both, it can be challenging as well. But really focusing on that niche, I think works really well for us.

Kevin Weitzel: [00:06:00] And you have to work with even micro municipalities. So, you're not just working within like a county or a city, you might have to go to a different county. Like in, let's say Raleigh, if you're out there in the outskirts, you might have to deal with some other small little entity at a small township that might have a completely different set of rules as far as building a home. Is that correct?

Rachel Starratt: For sure. Yeah, and even HOAs. I mean, every HOA is different and, you know, figuring those out. I mean, there are endless challenges when it comes to build on your lot, for sure.

Greg Bray: All right. I've got a question about terminology. Based on the people that you talk to, since you're doing so much, on your lot, is that home builder industry jargon, or do customers get that phrase and use that phrase? Like, if they're searching for you guys or things like that, is that a phrase that you feel like the consumer knows, or is that just something that we throw around as industry conversationalists?

Rachel Starratt: Well, based on the data for search terms, it definitely is a term that home buyers and prospective customers are [00:07:00] using. We actually don't use it externally. So, with our customers, we are build on your land. Lot is a bad word to us. We try not to say it whenever possible, because it doesn't sound as great. I think build on your land is something that resonates with a lot more people.

Kevin Weitzel: Note to self. I have a new term that I get to add to the list that Greg says I'm not allowed to say on the podcast. Lot has to go on the naughty list, Greg or no?

Greg Bray: For full disclosure, Kevin has been given a list of things not to say on the podcast. All right. But most of those are things that, you know, we're trying to let people listen in the car with their kids.

Kevin Weitzel: Yeah. The Navy Marine Corp slang terms are the ones that I'm not allowed to say on the podcast.

Greg Bray: But lot is a bad word versus land, especially someone who's not in a more formal community type setting. I can totally understand. I got a farm. I don't have a lot. What are you talking about? I just need a house out here. So, I can totally understand that. That's interesting. So Rachel, you mentioned that you started out in online sales as the OSC, [00:08:00] and now you guys have grown and expanded. Tell us a little bit about that journey of going from one OSC to a team that is responsible for online sales.

Rachel Starratt: That really was a journey. I mean, it started off adding one more online sales consultant as leads grew and demand grew. Of course, then when COVID hit, it was go from two to five or six very quickly, which is what we did. So, that journey looked a little differently than it would now, just because of COVID. But it took a little while. The first OSC that we added really allowed us to kind of get into the flow of having a team, which made it a little bit easier once we had to add the third, fourth, fifth, and actual six OSC at one point as well.

Kevin Weitzel: So, follow up to that. That's actually interesting, and this is something that Greg and I haven't covered on any of our interviews yet. When you scaled up for COVID, is that team maintained or have you also scaled that back [00:09:00] down now that we're past that and much more in-person?

Rachel Starratt: Yeah, great question. So, you know, we as an online sales team in our organization, we do operate a little bit differently than I've seen most builders operate their online sales team. And part of that is because we are built on your lot and because of the amount of education that we have to do. But we typically overstaff our online sales team. So, right now we're at four, which is really not far off from where we were at six, but the leads that they're managing is a lot less. And we do that intentionally number one, so that we have more hours of the day and days of the week that we can cover, but also so that we have the time and attention to spend on the phone explaining build on your lot and being able to provide a better customer experience from that very first interaction.

Greg Bray: So Rachel, we've seen some mystery shop data where some folks were trying to measure how well builders were doing with their online [00:10:00] sales, and there's still this significant percentage of builders who don't even have an OSC role, evidently. What do you say to the builder who is still even now struggling to decide whether they need an OSC role on their team?

Rachel Starratt: What I say is call a builder who has one and call a builder who doesn't and see the difference, really see for yourself. It's hard to imagine that builders don't have one now. But what I always tell my team is. There's a reason that we have an online sales team, and it's because we don't want someone just answering the phone and answering a question and saying, Okay, give me a callback, you know, when you have questions. We have an online sales team for a reason, and it's to convert leads.

And so, whoever is answering the phone and not trained in online sales, they might provide a great customer experience, and they might be able to answer questions, but they are not trained to convert leads, so you're really missing a large portion of [00:11:00] conversion, and leads are expensive. And so, in my mind, it's my job to maximize every single lead that the organization has paid for. We do that through our online sales team.

Greg Bray: So, as you guys then get together as a team, you're doing training, you're talking about kind of best practices, what are some of those initial conversations that you have? Say you're bringing somebody new online and say, okay, you get that first call. What's the goal of the very first call? How much of it is set the appointment versus build trust versus educate the buyer, all of the above? What is kind of your process look like with that first call of contact?

Rachel Starratt: So, it really changes throughout the years. In COVID, it was very different than what our goal is now. But I think where we are currently is when you're on a call with a potential customer, if you're really doing your due diligence in asking the right qualifying questions, making sure that you're taking the time to [00:12:00] understand what's important to them, what they're looking for, the appointment naturally happens.

Sure. There's some training that we have to go through with things like overcoming objections because we are getting a lot of those now. And if you're not comfortable doing that, that's definitely a roadblock. But really it's just following the path that set out for you in the conversation, building your rapport, making sure you're asking the right questions, making sure you're listening. Through that, you have the opportunity to guide them on their next step which naturally makes sense based on the conversation that you've had, and it makes sense to the customer as well.

Greg Bray: Now, I believe that the online sales team has some of the greatest opportunity to provide feedback for improving websites because you guys are the ones talking to people who have been on the website. What are the things that you found work really well on builder websites and some of the areas where you've seen builders, in general, could maybe do a little better, that would help the online sales team be more [00:13:00] effective?

Rachel Starratt: I think accessibility to information. I mean, we think that everything is straightforward and that everything is easy to find, but it's because we're on the website all the time. And so, a lot of the feedback is pretty simple and basic, feedback that you wouldn't anticipate or expect. Like I can't find your floor plans. Well, they're under what to build or whatever, you know, it says on the taskbar, but simple things like that. Or I can't find the areas that you build. So, I think really it's accessibility to information, which is a lot of the time, why they call us also, to be honest, is to get the answers that they can't find. That's one thing.

And then I think the other thing is the amount of digestible content. That's on a website to really keep a customer engaged. There's only so much time, especially now these days that people will spend on the website. So I think really being intentional about the content that you [00:14:00] have with the goal in mind, obviously of having something that's quick and digestible, but really that they can binge.

Greg Bray: Hey, everybody. This is Greg from Blue Tangerine. And I just wanted to personally invite you to join Kevin and me at the upcoming Home Builder Digital Marketing Summit. It's going to be October 23rd and 24th in Raleigh, North Carolina. You do not want to miss this. We're going to have marketing education. We're going to have online sales counselor education. We're going to have networking, round table discussions, and of course, a whole lot of fun. So, make sure you get registered today and join us. You can get all the details at buildermarketingsummit.com. Can't wait to see you there.

How do you guys work within your team kind of going back and forth where somebody is contacting a different person? They talked to somebody, you know, last week, they didn't move forward at that time. They come back later. Is all of that in the CRM? Is that kind of [00:15:00] a handoff that you do? From a team standpoint for those who are kind of looking at moving from one to multiple, what are some of the nuances of that working together look like

Rachel Starratt: So, you for sure can set it up in different ways. How we have it set up is if, say, for example, you schedule an appointment that was originally someone else's lead, whoever originated that lead or whoever had that lead originally would get credit for the appointment. And it's more like a buddy system. I scratch your back 'cause I know you're going to scratch mine.

So, we want to make sure first and foremost that someone can answer the phone. And if you know, the first OSC is off and they speak to OSC two, all we really care about is that customer getting service. So, we do it more as a team and it seems to have worked really well for us.

Greg Bray: Do you guys have specializations within your team? Like, Oh, this is the person for area one versus area two or anything like that that you do, [00:16:00] or is everybody kind of covering everything together?

Rachel Starratt: So we cover everything together. You know, ideally, I would love to have, you know, market-specific OSCs. Just with how our lead volume and distribution is, it doesn't really make sense for us to do it that way. We have two divisions that are much busier than the other two. All of our OSCs service all of our areas and all of our counties.

Greg Bray: Are you guys exploring or utilizing any of the AI tools to help answer some of these questions and what do you see in the future there of where that line is between the chatbot tools versus the person and some of those questions that people are struggling with right now?

Rachel Starratt: That's really interesting because I did just do a demo with Automation Agency, which we learned about from your podcast, which is great.

Kevin Weitzel: Whoa. Whoa. Could you say that one more time? You're talking about Automation Agency right here in Arizona?

Rachel Starratt: Yeah.

Kevin Weitzel: And you learned about it on what podcast, what was that?

Rachel Starratt: On this podcast.

Kevin Weitzel: Mark that down in history, [00:17:00] Greg.

Greg Bray: I'm sure it happens all the time. We just don't hear about it. Sorry to interrupt.

Kevin Weitzel: Yes.

Greg Bray: Please continue.

Rachel Starratt: No, no problem. So, you know, initially, our thought, I think, in utilizing Automation Agency was more on the sales side when it comes to nurturing however many thousands and thousands of leads we have that necessarily aren't ready to move forward right now. But we did do a demo for an online sales counselor consultant. Originally I was kind of thinking, Oh gosh, I manage the online sales team, so in theory, this would be replacing my team.

And my boss asked me, is it your idea to replace your online sales team with AI and I said, No, no, no, that is not my idea. But in seeing the demo, I think there is a lot of potential for it in outside of regular business hours, whether it be late at night, being able to cover 24/7, especially these days is an opportunity that I think is something to consider for sure.

How [00:18:00] we operate as an organization, especially being build on your lot, that one-to-one personalized contact is really important for us, and being able to explain the nuances of what we do is very important. So, we'd really have to prove that was possible.

But, for example, on our website, our chat. There is no form to fill out. There is no automation in our chat. It goes directly to an OSC. You just say I have a question and someone responds to you. So, you know, we are very much about responsiveness and direct communication whenever possible. Hopefully, that answers your question.

Greg Bray: But I think it would be very possible for an AI tool to answer the question. Where are the floor plans on your website as opposed to tying up a person? There are those baseline kinds of repetitive, straightforward things that probably come up all the time that you could take care of quickly and help people move forward.

It's fascinating what some of these [00:19:00] tools can do already, and they're only getting better every day. So, to be experimenting with them is exactly where you should be in my opinion, you know, to try and understand. And it may not replace people on the team today, but it might let you scale or give a better level of service or things in the future.

Rachel Starratt: Yeah. We're excited about it. Just the opportunities, like you said, now or in the future. I think it's exciting and, you know, if you're not investigating or doing your research, it might be a little bit harder later on. But we definitely like to be at the forefront of technology and new opportunities.

Greg Bray: Do you have an experience where you had to fight for technology and then it didn't quite go the way you wanted to or you thought, oh, this is going to be great and nobody else wanted to play, you know, or anything like that?

Rachel Starratt: Yeah, I mean, you know, over the years we have definitely tried to adopt some technologies. Most recently our survey platform is something that we have struggled with. There was a training [00:20:00] platform that we have struggled with in the past that really, I think would have been phenomenal, but just the execution wasn't there, the adoption wasn't there. So, there are definitely times when it can be great and it just doesn't happen, but I think we've learned, you know, a lot from those experiences as well.

Greg Bray: Do you have any tips for somebody who's about to go down that road about how to get better buy-in from the team as you bring a new tool online?

Rachel Starratt: From my perspective, one of the most important things is ownership. So, who is really responsible for the success and implementation of this new technology? I think it has to be a person or a team, and if it's a team who's in charge of that team, that's going to be critical. A lot of the times there's too many hands in the pot. Nobody really knows who's responsible for what, and things just kind of fall away.

In regards to the adoption of a team and learning new technologies. Everyone really learns technology at a different pace, and that's definitely a [00:21:00] challenge when it comes to implementing new technologies on sales teams for sure. And it takes a lot of time and patience and repetitiveness. It's not something that is going to happen in one or two months, maybe even six months or a year. But it goes back to that original leader of that platform or the success, you know, of that implementation to make sure that that training is ongoing and is continual until you've reached the desired success of the platform.

Kevin Weitzel: That is probably the best answer that could ever be given for that question. And I'll tell you why. Because I have a slightly different philosophy. My philosophy is if I'm going to spend the money, and it's a lot of money for some of these platforms that, you know, builders implement. You use it or you don't have a job, you will be fired. Honestly, there are other industries, the auto industry is one of them, where if your OSCs in those industries don't use a CRM religiously, you pack your bags. You're not working here [00:22:00] anymore.

Rachel Starratt: We have that philosophy too.

Kevin Weitzel: But at least you have a compassionate aspect of looking at it and analyzing the fact that not everybody learns the same way, not everybody comes up to speed in the same capacity. So, that's a little checkmark note for awesome.

Rachel Starratt: Thanks.

Greg Bray: Well, I think too, Rachel, you hit on the idea that sometimes we expect to like put in an order, make a payment, install some software and everything just goes. It takes time. It takes training. It takes learning and probably three times longer than you want it to, to get people up that learning curve and being able to implement and feel comfortable and everything else. It is an investment in time, not just the money for the actual technology.

Rachel Starratt: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. And you need to always add time on to the time, you know, especially if you're trying to integrate technologies that work with other platforms that you have because that typically doesn't always go as expected for sure. So, there's obviously a lot of nuances and things to [00:23:00] consider. But that's definitely a challenge that we face a lot of the times when we're implementing new technologies is how they will work with our current platforms.

Kevin Weitzel: Rachel, Rachel, Rachel, would you love to go on tour with Greg and I, because there are so many builders that just think, Oh, I'm going to buy this widget and it's magically going to fix everything. But what they don't realize is that while they're vetting usually just for price and sometimes maybe a little bit of functionality, they rarely look at how can this tie into my website. How can this tie into my CRM or my ERP or even push to my contracting system? So, the fact that you just stated, basically, eloquently, that that is an important aspect of considering those platforms, another big ol frickin blue ribbon for ya, cause that was awesome.

Rachel Starratt: Thanks. Well, I think that's where a lot of the platforms really miss the mark. There's so many companies out there where I'm like, Hey, this would be amazing. This would be awesome. But when we look at how it works with our current [00:24:00] systems and its ability to integrate and it doesn't, it's like, Oh, it's kind of a non-starter.

You know, when you look at companies like NoviHome, they have probably been the best company to integrate with our processes and our platforms that I've dealt with or seen, and it just makes everything so much better. So, I think a lot of these companies really are missing the mark in what they need to do to be able to be accessible to more builders.

Greg Bray: It's almost Kevin like we should have her come to the upcoming Home Builder Digital Marketing Summit and share the stage with Cody from NoviHome and talk a little bit about some of this.

Kevin Weitzel: You know, what's the possibility of maybe a Rachel Starratt showing up to the Home Builder Digital Marketing Summit in Raleigh, North Carolina to be on a panel with Cody Smith of NoviHome?

Rachel Starratt: Pretty sure I will be there.

Kevin Weitzel: Whoa! You heard it here first, folks.

Greg Bray: Well, hopefully, they've already heard it in a whole bunch of other places. Well, Rachel, we appreciate your time today and some of the insights that you've [00:25:00] shared. Just a few more questions before we wrap up. Talk to us just for a minute about this middle ground of online sales as it sits between marketing and on-site sales for most builders and how you kind of connect those two together, and some of the good things and bad things that kind of come along with being this middle ground between those.

Rachel Starratt: Yeah. So, it's an interesting role to play, for sure. It's kind of like, you know, I have a voice on one side and I have a voice on the other side and it's kind of meeting them in the middle. We get great ideas from the online sales team. We get great ideas from the sales team. They're not always all possible, but what my role is to listen to the feedback, implement what I can, explain what I can't, and utilize as many people in the organization that I can to make what I do for our customers the best possible outcome.

Greg Bray: How do you decide which of those things you want to [00:26:00] implement yourself and which ones you want to bring in partners or consultants or agencies to help with?

Rachel Starratt: That definitely changes. I mean, I think the two factors, number one being expertise. So, who really has the better knowledge to apply what we need? Is it me? And I can usually say if I have it or if I don't, and if I don't, I'm going to outsource it but also costs. That's going to be a big factor as well to consider. But those are the two main things, expertise and cost.

Greg Bray: Well, Rachel, do you have any last words of advice that you'd like to share with our audience today? We've been fed well by your insights, but anything you wanted to make sure you got out there to the world?

Rachel Starratt: For marketers specifically, and even actually online sales consultants, don't be afraid to do something out of the norm. I think that home building tends to fit inside a box a lot of times in how we market and sell our homes and I don't think it needs to be that way. You know, it might flip-flop, but you will miss a hundred percent of the shots that you don't take. Every now and then go out on a limb for your [00:27:00] online sales consultants. Do something different in your follow-up. Send a crazy weird video email, put yourself out there. There are lots of different things that we can do outside of the process of what everyone is expecting and what everyone is used to.

Greg Bray: Send a crazy weird video email.

Rachel Starratt: I've seen some.

Kevin Weitzel: Are you telling me I need to dress up like Cupid and send a picture, you know, on Valentine’s Day to everybody, like a Cupid card with just me and a little Cupid outfit?

Rachel Starratt: Maybe a full-size Cupid outfit.

Kevin Weitzel: Like a fully clothed Cupid outfit, not just the little tiny cloth. Yes. Yeah, I hear you.

Greg Bray: Well, Rachel, thank you again for being with us. If somebody wants to connect with you, um, what's the best way for them to reach out and get in touch?

Rachel Starratt: You can find me on LinkedIn, or you can email me, rachel@reddoorhomesnc.com.

Greg Bray: Thank you again. And thank you everybody for listening today to the Home Builder Digital Marketing Podcast. I'm Greg Bray with Blue Tangerine.

 Kevin Weitzel: And I'm Kevin Weitzel [00:28:00] with OutHouse. Thank you.