Breaking The Glass Ceiling : Women Entrepreneurs Celebrating International Women’s Day.

When opportunity knocks, it takes an intuitive and self-starting entrepreneur to seize the advantage and run with it. Back in 2007, LINKS property saw a market opening for a new type of real estate agency on the Surf Coast. With the rapid rise of new media and technology, Lynne Hayden’s vision was to market and sell homes without a bricks and mortar shop front and instead, use the growing preference of the internet. At the time, this was considered a little different. Today, 86% of potential buyers use online as their main tool to search for property. (1) Ten years of persistence and knowing that marketing your property to its best potential online is a very important part of your sales strategy, LINKS continues to thrive as an innovative real estate business, challenging traditional industry norms.

LINKS Property is owned by women entrepreneurs. Wikipedia states that 1/3 of all entrepreneurs worldwide are women. Women entrepreneurs are defined as a women or group of women who initiate, organise and run a business enterprise. LINKS Property Directors Lynne Hayden and Suzy Jones lead an all female team of staff, a clear point of difference in the real estate game. “Starting up an all-female team was a natural extension for us despite the challenges. Until the 1990s, real estate was still very much a man’s world,” says Hayden, “making the decision to close our shop front also didn’t come without trepidation, but, with the boom of smart phones, social media and new ways of searching for information, we had to be at the forefront of technology. We jumped right in and moved to a SOHO (small office home office) backing ourselves with growing internet statistics together with a fresh understanding of how people shop for real estate.”

Women play a key role in property purchasing decisions and how the family home is marketed for sale.
A current survey conducted by Neilson, tells us that 59% percent of property searches online via realestate.com.au are by women. (2) “When it comes to buying real estate the relationship recipe of happy wife happy life holds true!” says Jones. The old hat, aggressive style of selling real estate has moved on to a more empathetic style.“The industry is progressing with female agents at the forefront of agencies, using a feminine approach, that is more intuitive than the typical assertive male style.” says Jones. The LINKS team knows how it feels to fall in love with a home and understands that you are purchasing an opportunity to create a lifestyle for you and perhaps your family. LINKS takes a wholehearted, attentive approach to home sales, land sales and property management.

The Surf Coast shire boasts over 3000 businesses. The LINKS Property Surf Coast Women In Biz, a Facebook campaign to shout out local women entrepreneurs, has received an overwhelming response from the community who are passionate about and actively support women in business. This International Women’s Day (March 8th), the all-female LINKS team will be celebrating 10 years in business, over 30 years of collective real estate experience and the placing of more than 3000 happy families into the best Surf Coast homes. They love what they do. Happy International Women’s Day.

1 Residential Consumer Property Seeker Report, January 2015.                                                                                           2 Nielsen Digital Ratings, November 2016.
3 www.economy.id.com.au/surf-coast/about