Why did you start your business?

I have been working closely with people to help them meet their goals for decades, ever since my second job out of college in a sports medicine physical therapy center! From there, I evolved into corporate employee health and productivity which began with working one-on-one with employees and expanded to serve large corporate populations nationwide.

But I missed working directly with individuals and wanted to apply my business skills to a new industry. This sentiment happened to coincide with the purchase of my first house in Fairfield in 2004, and I’ve been serving my real estate clients ever since!

How many local businesses do you use to support your business (products and services) and can you name them?

There are so many different aspects to helping my clients transition from one home to another, so I need to depend on many other local businesses to get the job done! These businesses include attorneys like Sharon Jones and Jessica Gonzalez at Jones-Washburn-Gonzalez in Westport, appraisers, in particular Pat Labella, who has been a trusted resource for me when I’ve had questions along the way, inspectors, especially David Leopold of Pillar to Post, contractors such as Claudio Salvador at CNS Flooring, Marc G Andre Architects, and Snap-Estate photographers.

I have also utilized several local businesses for closing gifts, including Terrain in Westport and Aurora’s Cafe, and Beehive in Fairfield. For a fun after-work example of supporting small business, (in addition to all the local eateries I frequent), take a look at this fun Reel on Instagram.

Have you reimagined your small business?

It’s more of continuous evolution to meet my client’s needs and strive to exceed their expectations than completely reimagining my business. Customer needs shift based on changes in their environment. So I try to be as creative and innovative as I can to best serve them.

The pandemic, of course, has had a huge impact on how most of us approach our work. Some of the changes I had made when we were locked down included property showings via Facebook video and listing meetings via Zoom. Instead of in-person open houses, I created very detailed walk-through videos of my listings to share online with prospective buyers. Some of these new processes still come in handy! I had also chosen from day-one to work for William Raveis Real Estate because it is a privately owned and family-run regional company that is a top-notch innovator.

They are ready to pivot to meet agent needs so that we are always empowered to be the most effective and the most competitive in the marketplace. For example, to meet the acute need to move quickly, that many people had, the company developed and implemented a suite of services that enables people to fast-track home improvements with no out-of-pocket expense, gain instant access to the equity in their homes, and make competitive cash offers when they would otherwise need to finance.

The ability and mindset to launch these creative solutions quickly to meet the demand are the beauty of the small customer-centric business.

Make no mistake though, we have powerful global reach with our elite Leading Real Estate Companies of the World network alliance! So continuous reimagining is the ongoing strategy I use along with my brokerage, mixed with a healthy dose of passion and creativity to provide the best solutions for our clients. This is the small business ‘secret sauce’ that keeps our clients happy and coming back for more!

Linda Raymond – William Raveis Real Estate is located at 2525 Post Road in Southport. Visit Linda Raymond –online here, and make sure to check out her Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter pages as well!

Contact Linda below if you would like to discuss your moving plans.