March 2026 - Nuggets- All Things Beautiful

“You don’t sell the steak; you sell the sizzle.” And with that sentiment, an entire industry was born – marketing. Here at RE/MAX Garden City Realty Inc., we’ve had a marketing department in place for well over 30 years. And it’s there to help the agents sell the sizzle. Mind you, there have been a lot of changes over the years since we first rolled out a marketing department. Those early days truly were ‘cut and paste’. A lot of tasks involved layouts for newspaper ads. Then of course, feature sheets came along, and ‘just listed’ and ‘just sold’ cards. And not only did the applications continue to develop, but so did the way things all came together. Computer-generated images were a huge help, both in speed and sources of imagery. Megan Beam is the young lady who heads up our marketing department. She’s creative and very multi-faceted in her abilities, whether it’s creating promotional cards, multi-page presentation folders or office training manuals, no task is too great for her to take on. And believe me, she gets a lot thrown her way. Walk into our head office at Lake and Carlton Plaza, and you’ll be greeted by a themed window poster in keeping with the season. Walk into the marketing department, and an array of past marketing samples will give you an idea of what is available. But Megan doesn’t do it all single-handedly. In our Grimsby office, Cynthia Kindree handles a huge assortment of agent creative needs on site as does Joanne O’Keefe at our Fonthill office. They all do a wonderful job. And while we’ve seen the process change over time as computers and AI provide imaging support tools, so too has the demand changed as well. Where once a couple of photos sufficed to present the listed property, today we have 360⁰ video that enables the consumer to interact and ‘walk’ through the property. Jim Holiko, our Director of IT, along with all his technology talents, attends at the newly listed properties with his iGuide camera to shoot the video footage along with a huge assortment of still shots both inside and out. And speaking of videos, we also have a couple of studios set up, one which utilizes a green screen, whereby we can place agents in front of pretty much any scene they like. The other, overseen by Rocky Pepe, is set up for interviews primarily. But beyond that, Rocky adds sophistication with music and script and then strategically posts the videos on several social media sites and on the web. And when we talk about script, we can’t forget Michelle Bruce, the amazing Director of Social Media who works with our agents to help develop script, participates in video interviews and brainstorms with our agents on how to use social media and a host of platforms to get the message out. Yes, we’ve come a long way from ‘cut and paste’. A lot of it is thanks to advancements in technology, where with a push of a button, empty rooms can be furnished, walls can be painted, and ideas can come to life. There’s no end of tools available today to help ‘sell the sizzle’, but it takes talent and dedication to make it come to life. Here at RE/MAX Garden City Realty, we’ve got an outstanding team that knows exactly how to do just that. And another one on staff who’s been a part of our marketing department pretty well since its inception is Susan Dagenais. In fact, this year marks 30 years that Susan has been part of the team. She began at the front desk reception, but quickly moved on into our fledgling marketing department, handling all our print media, especially newspaper and dedicated real estate publications. A lot of the demand for newspaper ads has died down, but Susan is still involved there, as well as walking the new agents through sign selections, business card designs and all the components new agents need to get up and running. In addition to everything else she does, Susan is also a key part of each month of the development of this e-newsletter you are in the process of reading. And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Elijah Allison of Allison Media Co. Although Elijah doesn’t directly interact with our agents, he is certainly active behind the scenes. Elijah is a huge part of the development of our e-newsletter each month, creating graphs and charts and providing all the visuals and illustrations that make it come to life. And once a month, when our Anniversaries and Awards video is sent out to our agents, it’s once again Elijah’s magic that brings visuals to showcase our agents. Thanks, Elijah. While real estate will always be a relationship business with agents working hand in hand with buyers and sellers, there’s a whole host of resources available behind the scenes helping those agents sell the sizzle. Here at RE/MAX Garden City Realty marketing, we’ve got a wonderful team of some of the best in the industry doing just that.