Lose More Real Estate Clients with Music!

Dear sound-loving real estate agent,

You are doing exceptionally well in your endeavor to ensure that potential clients stay on your page for 15 seconds, leave and never come back again. We also warn our friends and family about people like you. While we can be quite irritated, be assured that we don’t hate you personally. We may think that someone who embeds music or, worse, “beautiful sounds” on their website is malevolently inclined towards those who are seeking to buy or sell a home, is tone-deaf and quite possibly does not consult their clients’ comfort as much as they ought, but we don’t hate YOU.

We hate your music. The notes that fall so sweetly to your ears are an aural hell for those of us who do not share your appreciation for Barry Manilow, Bach or AC/DC. No, having a rock song tinkled out on an embedded MIDI player does not make you cool. We loathe the “sounds of spring” or “softly falling water” that you delude yourself creates a “peaceful atmosphere”. We despise bells, whistles, sirens, clicks and any other noise that you hope draws our attention to your featured listings or your contact page.

You also may not realize that while the intent is recognizable, the song or sound is not. Your “babbling brook” actually sounds like the static of the TV when you’ve accidentally punched channel 0 instead of channel 10. Your glorious electronic rendition of Beethoven’s “The Pastoral” brings to mind the last time we were forced to go to Little Timmy’s talent show where three misguided youngsters tried to saw through their violins with catgut and didn’t stop for 15 minutes. And you… YOU brought it all back again.

And not only did you bring it back, you brought it back at 150 decibels, which made it sound roughly like a jet engine roaring to life right beside our computer. In addition to the hearing loss brought around by an unanticipated explosion of sound, whatever we were listening to was completely drowned out by your need that we thrill to the notes of “You’re the Light of My Life” and continued to be drowned out until we found the button that shut your miscreation of the Internet down.

Is it any wonder why you’re not getting any leads? If your goal is to specialize in homes for the hearing impaired, you have found your calling and the ultimate method of screening your clients. Because as soon as the first tortured screech of the harpies you fondly believe are “birds twittering in the twilight”, we frantically shot our cursor to the little X at the top corner of the screen and clicked onetwothreefourfivesixseveneight times to ensure that the abomination was killed.

In the process, we also inadvertently shut down several projects we were working on without saving them. But it was worth it. It also explains why, after turning the sound completely off, we will not be coming back. Irritation can do that to people and if you’re irritating us before you’ve even emailed or spoken to us, well we don’t want to know what travesties you can accomplish in our actual presence.

We will not be coming back. Ever. Your page has all the charm of a pack of yipping Chihuahuas in the neighbor’s yard of the house we will now not be buying. No matter how well laid out and beautifully colored your web page is, the annoying forced sound does not give us any inclination to stick around long enough to discover the many conveniences that you can offer. There are plenty of real estate agents out there with beautifully laid out pages that are utterly silent. As we peruse those blissfully quiet pages, it may well occur to us that this agent may also be efficient and non intrusive. Perhaps we should give them a call.

Have a nice day,

Your former prospective client.