Katie Clancy, Celebrator on Fire

Christina Frei

You might think that Celebrators have it easy as marketers. After all, they have flair, style, humor, overt enthusiasm, or design sense and they bring to the good life to others when they’re healthy. Their lives (and their marketing) can seem like a constant celebration. That’s their thing.

But it’s not like that.

Katie Clancy, a featured speaker at the National Association of Realtors Conference in Boston this year, hit rock bottom after the 2008 crash, where her husband’s business ended, her marriage grew shaky, and she lost a baby. Somehow she went from there to being the #6 agent in William Raveis in her region (Cape Cod) and in the top 3% of Cape Cod agents.

In the thick of it, Katie could barely help herself. But she made a key decision: help others whenever she could. It was the least she could do. Echoing the tenets of the Generosity Practice, Katie knew the power of helping others when she couldn’t help herself. It pulled her through like nothing else could. The deep fulfillment of being a contribution became the foundation of her business and her entire marketing approach, called Relationship Marketing.

Fast forward 10 years.

What does all that look like specifically today?  Katie will give a ‘mystery’ envelope to a new homebuyer, where they only see the name of the local deli owner on the outside. With instructions to go find this person and give them the envelope, the buyer meets business owner (very cool for someone new to the neighborhood), lets them open the envelope to discover that they are receiving a gift – maybe some sandwiches. Everyone is delighted and everyone wins.Katie gives 5 of these to her buyers (!).

Also, a hip local bar named a cocktail after her business, and every time someone orders it, Katie donates $5 to a local land trust. Again, Katie carefully and thoughtfully builds relationships and trust as a Celebrator. Everybody wins.

Katie is a visionary, someone who wants to make real estate the happiest industry on the planet (her words). She sees home buying and home selling as a sacrament, up there with marriage and birth, where real estate agents are as impactful as any doctor or minister.

All her marketing, from YouTube video tips to cheerful Facebook announcements to heartfelt talks, brings the good life to others. Her website tagline is “We leave people better than we found them.”

If you are a Celebrator (curious?), you don’t need to be exactly like Katie. Katie insists, “You can follow me around and copy what I do, but it won’t work. This is not a tactical shift, it is a mindset.”  But you can have as much fun and fulfillment as she does.

That’s what I do – identify your version of that. So let’s walk that path together, starting here.