Luxury Real Estate Marketing: The Luxury of Magnificence

Shamanka Rock, Lake BaiKal, Siberia

As a luxury real estate marketing professional it is important to understand the subtle nuances in the meaning of luxury itself. Luxury can mean lavishness, creature comforts, sumptuousness, opulence and extravagance. Yet, it can also be the appreciation of the simplest things in life like a beautiful sunset that requires only the time to observe and enjoy it. This is the luxury of magnificence.

Some of the most magnificent luxuries on our planet include mountains, oceans, seas, rivers, lakes, forests and deserts. One lake contains more than 20% of the world's fresh water supply. Lake Baikal, in Siberia, (also known as the "sacred sea") is the oldest and deepest lake in the world. It measures 400 miles long and 5700 feet deep in the center. It holds more water than all of the Great Lakes combined.

One can clearly see a depth of 75 feet from the surface. Because of the high level of oxygenation, the lake is teaming with fish and organisms even at the bottom. Baikal is home to more than 1,700 species of plants and animals, two thirds of which can be found nowhere else in the world. Some of the species have yet to be identified or categorized. New breakthroughs are continuously discovered there. For example, scientists are testing fresh water sponges from Lake Baikal which may be capable of curing certain cancers.

Our excitement about Lake Baikal was ignited by the story of a marine biologist, Marina Rikhvanova, who succeeded in having an oil pipeline moved two miles away from the lake. Had the government's plan succeeded, a single oil spill could have polluted the lake in 20 minutes. Traveler's magazine gave her the World Saver's Environmental Award.

In Japan people of great talent and artistry are honored as national treasures. As we see it, Marina is a global treasure. Seek out the richness and generosity of spirit in the people around you and you will find a vast and deep reservoir of luxury.

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Luxury Real Estate Marketing: Salts of the Earth

If you are considering a house warming gift for the holidays, and you are invited by those who fancy themselves to be gourmets, here is a relatively inexpensive but thoughtful idea for you: Gourmet Salt! Understanding the varieties of gourmet salts can also give you social currency, as a luxury real estate marketing professional, among those in the know on this topic.

One of the latest gourmet treats is to finish a dish with a particular type of salt. For instance, Fleur de Sel, a French salt is gathered with a special rake to harvest only the top layer of the salt bed. This work is usually done by women because of their delicate handling of the rake. The name "Fleur de Sel" comes from the aroma of violets that develops as the salt is dried. Fleur de Sel is recommended when baking chocolate cake to enhance its taste.

The list of gourmet salts is quite extensive. Peruvian pink salt is the one for that beefsteak tomato you just picked from your garden. Nazuna sea salt, from Japan, transforms the taste of fish and seafood. Hawaiian pink salt is great for grilling your meats.

The fascination with salt is not a new one. Until the 1900s, salt was considered a currency. Salt was often taxed, and some clever bakers (the Italians) figured out how to make bread without salt, so they would not be taxed. The Romans paid part of their soldiers‚ wages in salt. The word "SALARY" is derived from the Latin word "salarium" meaning a payment made in salt. The 12th century Mali Empire in Africa valued salt so much that paid for its weight in gold.

Salt is also used for bathing. For instance, salts from the Dead Sea, the second saltiest body of water in the world, were used by Cleopatra for bathing. She paid for and obtained exclusive rights over the Dead Sea area, so she could continue her beauty regimen. She also built pharmaceutical and cosmetic factories near the Dead Sea. The ruins of these factories remain to this day.

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Luxury Real Estate Marketing: Sustainable Living - A New Standard of Luxury

Female Eider Duck and her Chicks

To become an expert luxury real estate marketing professional it is very important to know your luxury buyer’s mindset. Not all luxury buyers are conspicuous consumers or jet setters. In the quest for the best, sustainable living and caring for the environment have increasingly becoming mainstream priority values.

Identifying your buyers’ priority values and amplifying them in your selection and presentation of properties allows you to connect with your clients on a very deep emotional level, the level where most buying decisions are made. Taking these factors into account can accelerate the pace at which you build a trusting relationship. It lets your clients know that you care about what is important to them.

Sustainable living is all about aiming for a lifestyle that can be sustained without exhausting natural resources. It is a new standard of luxury and it is reflected in consumers’ choices of goods and services. It applies to individuals as well as communities.

Do You Know What the Best Duvets in the World Are Make Of?

Vega Archipelago in Norway is a beacon of sustainable living due to a partnership between human being and nature. According to UNESCO’s World Heritage List, these islands are representative of “the way generations of fisherman and farmers have, over the last 1500 years, maintained a sustainable living in an inhospitable seascape near the Arctic Circle, based on the now unique practice of eider down harvesting.”

Each year, during the nesting season, the inhabitants of the main island, Vega, move to the smaller islands to build eider houses for the eider ducks. They use old boats, driftwood and bricks to build a safe environment for the birds’ nests. Eiders are the source of eiderdown, feathers that the female plucks from her chest to line the nest and insulate her eggs. The humans protect the eggs and the hatchlings from their natural predators.

Once the ducklings are hatched and sea worthy, the nest is left to use for eider down duvets. It takes approximately 70 nests to make one duvet. These duvets last for over 100 years, and are literally “light as a feather”. They are simply the best duvets in the world.

If you want to impress an environmentally conscious client, especially in a mountain resort location, give them an eiderdown duvet for a closing gift. They will remember you every time they turn down the bed.

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Luxury Real Estate Marketing: Salute to Eco-Cool Luxury

Photo Courtesy of Aston Martin

If market leadership is your quest, as a luxury real estate marketing professional, it is essential that you look beyond your immediate marketplace and explore innovative ideas in the realm of luxury goods and services. That is one of the key precepts behind the Language of Luxury. Learning about what is cool in the world of luxury is a must. It can sharpen your own focus when crafting your personal brand and also help you to attract more high net worth clients.

By far one of the world’s coolest brands is Aston Martin. You may have first encountered an Aston Martin as the tricked-out sports car driven by James Bond in Goldfinger. Recent models have appeared in Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. So far these fine automobiles have been featured in 10 Bond films.

In 2011, Aston Martin will go eco-cool with its new city car, the Cygnet, that sets a new benchmark for compact luxury. Cygnet demonstrates Aston Martin's commitment to innovation while conforming to strict new emission and size standards in Europe. The Cygnet simply does not compromise Aston Martin’s rich heritage of style, artistry, performance and personality.

At just three meters long, the Cygnet gives the driver a new dimension of freedom, able to slip into gaps in traffic, exploit the smallest parking spaces, consume the least fuel and emit the lowest emissions, all while delivering exceptional levels of quality and comfort. According to Marek Reichman, Aston Martin's Director of Design, “With an almost unlimited palette of materials, colors and textures, each hand-finished Cygnet will be truly unique, a personalized space within the city”. He says, “Luxury is not constrained by scale.”

Adopting to change is crucial in your luxury real estate marketing practice. But, change does not have to mean sacrificing quality of service.

Photo Courtesy of Aston Martin

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Luxury Real Estate Marketing: An 18 Carat Gold Marketing Idea

Hong Kong

While Google and Apple duke it out in the smart phone market space, one luxury smart phone brand, Ventu, stands apart by adding an extraordinary promise of value for the discerning consumer. Vertu provides an excellent example of how to differentiate you as a luxury real estate marketing professional.

Google’s Android smart phone platform is surging ahead and gobbling up market share from most major contenders except Apple. One in five smart phones now run Android. But, with most of the Apple’s competitors using same Android platform how can one be remarkably distinct from the next? How can these competitors hope to compete with each other? Watch for price wars. That will surely be the result of this glaring example of commoditization.

Enter Vertu! Vertu recently launched their first smart phone in Hong Kong—the Constellation Quest—which is available in 18 carat yellow gold and surgical grade stainless steel. It is truly functional art.

Each Vertu smart phone is manufactured by a single craftsperson. When you purchase the phone its settings are personally configured for you by Vertu’s trained assistants, based on your individual preferences. After the purchase, you can avail yourself of their 24/7 personal assistance program called Vertu Remote Assist. You r phone is accessed remotely, with permission, on an as-needed basis by Vertu’s technical support team who also offers you concierge service.

How can you apply Ventu’s strategy in your luxury real estate marketing practice?

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Luxetera, Etc.: TheTaste of Excellence!

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The international Caviar House & Prunier offers travelers a Taste of Excellent at Terminal 4 in JKF Airport, New York. Click Here if this video is not displayed in your email subscription.

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Luxury Real Estate Marketing: Embracing Change Provides the Competitive Edge

When going after the market leadership position as a luxury real estate marketing professional, you will often find that the incumbent is complacent and slow to adapt to new technology. Those of you who can recognize when major trends are afoot and are quick to respond can make great strides in out-thinking your competition.

Steve Jobs said no Flash for Apple mobile devices. Did this pronouncement stop consumers from buying Apple’s mobile products? Apple sold 4.2 million iPads in the last quarter. But, what about those luxury goods online stores that built their websites on Flash? When Jobs speaks, they have to listen, because if they do not their competition will. Adaptation to change provides the competitive edge.

High-end clothing and accessories merchants have spent lavishly to liven up their e-commerce websites with video and animation that run on Adobe's ubiquitous Flash technology. It is understandable that they are frustrated with Mr. Jobs’ position. But, customers are increasingly accessing the web while on the go via mobile devices. And, iPads are expected to be one of the hottest selling items during the Holidays. Target, Best Buy and even Verizon are now geared up to sell these tablets with the expectation of cashing in on Apple’s popularity.

Net-a-Porter.com, a top luxury online retailer jumped on the alternative technology to build their site and now has a competitive edge over megastores such as Saks 5^th Avenue this season. Being nimble in relationship to competitors who are more entrenched in the status quo can give you the leg up.

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