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Opinion + Operations
The Problem with On The Market Canvassing
By The Digital Estate Agent
13 January 2026
8 min read
If you want income-generating staff to generate income, you keep them connected to information and you strip away the admin that technology can perform better, faster, and more consistently than a human.
In 2006, on my very first day as a letting agent, I felt two professional passions click into place at the same time. I was tucked away on a business park in Chiswick and handed a Nokia flip phone that was integrated with the company’s bespoke CRM. They showed me how I could search for information while out on appointments, pull up contact details instantly, see my diary, read emails, message colleagues, and call anyone relevant to the job without having to return to a desk.
It sounds ordinary now, but at the time it felt like a glimpse of how the industry was supposed to work. I’ve always loved property, and I’ve always loved technology, and that first day taught me a simple principle that has stayed with me ever since. If you want income-generating staff to generate income, you keep them connected to information and you strip away the admin that technology can perform better, faster, and more consistently than a human.
Nineteen years later, I’ve just finished a role at an independent agency that had drifted in the opposite direction. Staff were encouraged to drive around town and identify properties on the market with other agents. Smartphone applications were disabled on the CRM. Lists were still being built and maintained in spreadsheets to identify opportunities and organise compliance responsibilities.
The irony is that this business had recently moved from a server-based system to a web-based system, complete with API integrations. The technology had taken a step forward, but the working practices had remained stuck in the past.
People work hard inside these systems. The waste is not in the effort. The waste is in the workflow.
I wish I could tell you this is rare. It isn’t. I’ve visited branches where boards are counted manually, where staff are screen-scraping addresses, where spreadsheets multiply, where several disconnected software packages do roughly the same thing, and where servers and inboxes are clogged with processes that exist purely because “that’s how we’ve always done it.”
A single example is enough to expose the scale of the problem: identifying properties that are on the market with competitors. Most agencies have some method for this, whether it is a market intelligence tool, portal alerts, a digitised list maintained by a member of staff, or the truly old-fashioned approach of driving around and noting down door numbers and boards. However it starts, it tends to end in the same place.
A letter is produced and sent to the prospective client who is currently listed elsewhere.
If we are honest, we all know what these letters look like. We have seen them, we have read them, and many of us have thrown them away. The letter itself is only the visible output. The real cost sits underneath, in the time, the subscriptions, and the opportunity cost of tying up staff to perform repetitive tasks that can be automated.
Even when you use the most “efficient” option, the reality is not particularly efficient. A competent member of staff still has to search for the listing, assess whether it is eligible, cross-reference the address in the CRM, prepare the letter, print it, and post it. In the real world, the total time per property is not a few seconds. It is a few minutes.
Multiply that by the volume required to make canvassing worthwhile and you are quickly talking about a full working day each month, sometimes more, spent producing and sending letters.
That time has a direct cost, even at junior pay rates, and it stacks up fast once printing and postage are included. Then come the subscriptions, which can be several hundred pounds a month. If you want to make the activity truly targeted, you run into the next cost layer, which is ownership data.
If you pay for Land Registry title documents to reach the actual owner, you can easily add another substantial monthly cost. It is not unusual for a single branch to be spending well over a thousand pounds a month on this one activity once you combine subscription, staff time, postage, and ownership data.
That brings me to what I think is the most damaging cost of all, and it is not the one that appears on an invoice. It is the hidden cost of focus. Every hour spent compiling lists and preparing letters is an hour not spent on conversations that move the business forward.
There is another layer to this, which many owners feel instinctively but rarely measure properly. Your ability to win instructions from competitors is limited by your ability to see the market clearly. Most market intelligence tools do a good job, but they do not give you perfect coverage.
Then there is the piece that almost nobody wants to talk about, because it sounds harsh, but it is true. Much of the messaging that goes out is not good enough. Many canvassing letters say the same things in slightly different words. Better service. Better marketing. Lower fees. “We have buyers.” “We have tenants.”
What makes this particularly frustrating now is that we have the tools to fix it quickly. A modern large language model can help you write persuasive, professional, empathetic outreach that actually sounds like you, and it can do it in minutes, not hours.
This is the reason I’m building The Digital Estate Agent. I’m interested in removing the repetitive admin that drains good people, replacing fragmented processes with joined-up workflows, and giving agency owners a way to grow without simply adding more chaos.
If you’d like, I can share the workflow I use to reduce the manual burden of competitor monitoring and outreach while improving targeting and message quality. No hype, no grand claims, just a practical approach that respects the reality of running a busy branch.
