Matthews Retail Advisors Redefines Expectations

LOS ANGELES—Matthews Retail Group has hit another major growth spurt. Currently the largest retail-focused brokerage firm in the country, the firm is 65 employees strong and experiencing more than double year-over-year growth in revenue. Now, the firm is rebranding as Matthews Retail Advisors, a move that includes a new logo and website (http://www.matthews.com). To find out about the rebrand and the firm's strategy, we sat down with Eric Boyd, chief marketing officer, for an exclusive interview. Boyd proves the growth has been built on innovation without detouring from the firm's homegrown philosophy—grounded by high-client service—that drove the company to success.

GlobeSt.com: What inspired Matthews Retail Group to rebrand?

Eric Boyd: It has to do with Kyle Matthews' vision, the vision of our leadership team and expanding our business. This is more than a rebrand. We are operationally restructuring so that we can make room to expand into additional real estate services as well as to expand our offices. We have been known by clients for many years as Matthews Retail Group, and our new name is Matthews Retail Advisors, a business unit of Matthews Real Estate Investment Services. As a company, Matthews Retail Group has been larger than most retail-focused brokerage firms for a long time, both in membership and revenue. Our long-term vision is to continue on the path of becoming a multi-billion dollar publicly traded company. This is just another step in that direction. Really, the rebranding and the restructuring of the business is to make room for our continued expansion. Our revenue and size of the company has been growing by 110% year over year for the past several years with no signs of slowing down.

GlobeSt.com: Tell me about your new strategy, and how this is a shift from your original strategy?

Boyd: Our message hasn't changed, but there are several features and benefits that Matthews Retail Advisors provides uniquely to clients, and over the years, we have been fairly low-key about marketing those benefits in the press. We keep our strategy and our keys to success close to the vest, but with the launch of our new brand, we are taking a bolder approach. We have a new logo and a new website at a new location, www.matthews.com. The direct communication style highlights our track record and our superior execution over other firms, as well as the innovation in our processes, technologies and in the competitive drive, as a team, to exceed expectations for every one of our clients on every one of our deals. We are asking clients to redefine their expectations. We want our clients and prospective clients to better understand how we deliver a higher level of execution than they are familiar with from other brokerage companies. We are speaking more boldly and more expressively to our clients that they need to expect the most knowledgeable broker in their retail vertical, real-time marketing execution using the technologies and techniques of Silicon Valley, a 1031 exchange program and to expect the best advisory service that is specific to their tenant, the region, the demographic, the neighborhood of their location and their tenants' business strategy.

GlobeSt.com: You have had a unique strategy from the beginning. What are some of the ways that you have been able to be so successful?

Boyd:We've developed marketing, sales and analytics technologies, as well as processes and programs which give us an edge in execution for clients to ensure we get the highest price for the sale of an asset. Click-to-Sale Technology™ enables us to generate the right offers through an automated tracking and analysis of the digital behavior of buyers. It alerts the broker to contact the buyer at the most opportune moment when they are considering an investment. Point of Analysis Interjection™ is a sales process which enables our brokers to contact multiple buyers, each at the moment they are considering a deal, to upsell the positives and overcome objections before they are formed. The 1031 Private Client Advantage™ program is the only 1031 exchange program in commercial real estate to my knowledge, and is a step-by-step process using advanced algorithms to create a Risk Property Analysis for us to identify a sellers up leg and make an offer on the next investment as soon as the sale is in escrow. These types of innovations, along with a culture of passion and collaboration, and the largest shared pool of retail buyers in the industry have driven our success. We are asking clients to redefine their expectations based on the higher level of execution that no other firm can deliver.

GlobeSt.com: Can your former clients still expect the same services they have received in the past?

Boyd: Our clients can expect an even higher level of service and execution, but that really doesn't have anything to do with the re-launch of Matthews Retail Advisors. It has a lot more to do with the fact that we are continually investing in our clients. We are continuously training professionals; continuously analyzing market data; continuously studying the retail trends; continuously improving on technologies and our processes, growing our buyer pool, expanding our client base and growing our business. Our clients experience the benefits of our philosophy of constantly improving and innovating.