6 Marketing Tips For Real Estate Agents

Whether you’re just starting out in real estate or are a seasoned pro, there are always things you can do to improve your marketing initiatives. After all, your success as a real estate agent is dictated by your ability to market effectively.

The marketing ideas contained in this article are designed to help you jumpstart your real estate business. Even if things are going relatively well, you can always improve your marketing initiatives. The old adage “work smarter – not harder” is extremely relevant in this line of work and it is in your best interest to maximize every opportunity.

1. Designate a Marketing Day

If you really want your business to succeed, you need to make time for your business. As a real estate agent, you spend most of your time accommodating prospects; however, without a clear plan for growth, you are unlikely to expand your business at all.

Designating a marketing day simply means picking one day each week to spend at least a few hours applying new marketing strategies or looking for new opportunities that are easily missed due to your hectic schedule.

 

Monday is a great day to work on marketing your business. No one really likes Monday anyway, so why not take a few hours Monday morning to focus on business growth every week?

 

2. Identify and Focus on Your Target Market

Many real estate agents fall into the trap of working to expand their territory without regard for the actual customer base they are servicing. To improve your marketing efforts significantly, look at your most profitable customer niches and create a marketing plan tailored specifically to these people.

Spreading yourself too thin by looking to expand your territory is often counterproductive. Successful real estate agents know that the best way to attract new business is to focus on drawing in prospects in the area where you are already known. Otherwise, you’re stuck competing with real estate agents who are well-established in other territories and the results are usually lackluster at best.

3. Plan for Success

Every real estate agent wants to be successful. Unfortunately, many real estate agents enter a new market looking for just a small piece of market share. To be truly successful, you need to plan for success – think domination of your market.

 

Having a strong grasp on your market and your target customer base allows you to create business when other real estate agents are sitting at the office waiting for the phone to ring. Your success driven marketing strategy should be all encompassing. Literally, you need to take a “no holds barred” approach to marketing your real estate business to prospects and the community.

4. Stop Cold Calling

Cold sales calls are one of those things that most real estate agents are forced to do from time to time. The problem is that you never really get anywhere when following this faulty marketing approach. Think about it – when you are not busy you spend all of your time prospecting for new clients via cold sales leads. When you are busy, you do not have time to prospect so your business suffers after a short burst of activity.

 

This is a vicious cycle that is very frustrating and leads to many real estate agents burning out well before they have reached their potential in this business.

 

Focus on creating prospects that call you instead. That gives you more time to focus on growing your business while you wait for potential sales to walk through the door. There are quite a few ways to do this although one of the most popular seems to be creating recorded messages that compel clients to contact you for more information. These prospects are considered warm leads that have a genuine interest in your services. Once you get this ball rolling, it tends to stay in motion and your business can sail to new heights extremely quickly.

 

Take Charge of Your Sales Career is a course designed to teach effective sales plan execution so you can stop wasting time chasing prospects.

5. Remember that it’s not about being Famous

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that your success depends on “getting your name out there.” You are a real estate agent because you want to earn a living. Hopefully, you want to earn more than just a living – you want to be wealthy.

 

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this mindset and you should embrace it. Stop focusing on getting your name out there and focus on creating transactions that generate revenue for you and your business. The sooner you change your mindset and start thinking about the financial implications of your decisions, the more successful your real estate business becomes.

6. Use the Internet

Although most real estate agencies have some web presence, many of them rely on simple and forgettable designs that do not lend themselves well to the professional appearance you need to be truly successful in this competitive business.

 

In this technology driven age, one of the single best things you can do to improve your marketing strategies right now is to create a strong web presence. This means hiring a professional web designer to create a website that stands out from the competition, explains to customers the benefits of working with you specifically, and provides an easy way for prospects to contact you.

If you are not leveraging the power of the Internet for your real estate business, you are missing out on one of the single largest marketing opportunities available to you.

 

Of all these strategies, the most important is the first one. All of the other marketing ideas in this article require that you set aside time to implement these ideas and look for ways to improve your current marketing strategies and adopt new ones that provide a significant return on investment.

 

The only one accountable for your success is you – so why not take control and start implementing some new marketing strategies today?

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Increase customer contact and follow-up with our fully customizable Real Estate Agent Business Cards. Card features a Property Information Form on the reverse side. 90lb White Linen card stock. Box of 100. Ships Tomorrow!

Real Estate Agent Business Card (Pearl Finish)

Photo Business Cards (Pearl Finish)


Metal Business Card Case
Our sleak metal business card case is a must have for any executive! Luxery meets practicality with this contemporary and stylish executive card case. Put your best first impression forward to your clients and associates. Card case features a faux velvet inlay and snap closure. Holds 15 cards. Size: 3.69"W x 2.35"L x .34"d. Fully customizeable with your name and/or business logo.

 

Marketing Ideas For Real Estate Agents

Marketing ideas for real estate agents can take many shapes and price forms. You maybe use some form of direct mail to both your current clients and to new prospects. Perhaps you invest money in lead lists from 3rd party companies, selling you new names of people who have moved to the area. Or maybe you’re still paying to be listed in the Yellow Pages, or as most people know them, that book in the bag I have to throw out once a year. Whatever your current methods include, they all can be expensive, next to impossible to track, and for some, time consuming. That’s why I’ve put together a quick list of ideas to help you out with marketing as we close out 2013 and head into 2014.
Like a lot of your marketing efforts, your main focus is on getting in people who want to buy or sell a home. But as you already know, the majority of your leads you get in that become customers are those that are referred from your past clients. That’s why it’s important to nurture those past clients so you’re best positioned to getting in new referrals from past clients. Here’s 7 Marketing Ideas to help you increase your referral business in 2014.

1. Invite Friends & Email Contacts To Your Facebook Business Page

A lot of you might already have a Facebook business page (and if you don’t here’s a fantastic guide to help you set yours up), but you might not be using it to its fullest potential. You could be posting 16 times a day or not at all, but without having people who have “Liked” your page, then there’s no one there listening to what you’re saying. The best way to go about doing this is of course to be posting things regularly, but use the tools that Facebook gives you as a page owner. One of the more under utilized features is the ability to invite your email contacts to join your page. And why not? These are the people who know you, have most likely done business with you before, and the people that you want to target to get future referrals. Inviting email contacts is simple too. From your Facebook Business Page in the top right, all you have to do is click Build Audience > Invite Email Contacts…

You can see that you’re also able to Invite Friends in the same drop-down. Essentially what you want to do is have enough people you’ve done business with before on your page so that when you post things out, your messages are reaching the right people, helping you stay top-of-mind, and eventually drive referral business. And as always, there’s plenty of folks out there to lend you a helping hand with your social media efforts.

2. Keep In Touch With Past Clients Through Email (No, Not Like That)

I know you’re familiar with the “New listings” emails and the “new low rates in your neighborhood” emails. Nobody likes to get those and I’ll bet you that the majority of people either spam those messages or unsubscribe. Either way, you’re not on their radar and that’s not a good thing. Trust me, consumers know that you know interest rates, know how to list a home, and that you’re great at finding them their dream home too. When the time comes that they want to start looking, that’s when you strut your stuff. But these market trend emails are not helping your cause.

Instead, take the knowledge that you know, put it to good use, and craft a really good news letter. You’re great at staging homes, setting up showings, and know your city like the back of your hand. That’s all very powerful information that you can put to good use in a high quality, content marketing focused email campaign. Give people advice on staging their homes, picking out new colors, shopping for vintage furniture, upcoming events in your neighborhood, and more. This is what people care about and this is what will brand you as an incredibly smart resource.

3. Add Social Media Links To Your Website (And Vice Versa)

This might sound so simple, but it’s effective. The more that you can connect your digital profiles across all online application, the more clout you’ll have in terms of your authenticity in your area. Your Twitter account should link to your website. Your website should have links to your Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn accounts. Set up your Google Business Page using your Google+ profile to help you show up when people search locally for realtors. Essentially, if you’re online in any way, you need to make it incredibly easy for people to find you, click to more things, and easily get in touch with you.

4. Share Great Content To Your Social Accounts

Something that I tell all real estate agents is that they need to remember the 80/20 rule with their social media. 80% of what you share should not be about you or your business. Believe me, I’m friends with plenty of real estate agents on my personal Facebook account to know what bad posting looks like. Posting photos of ever listing you have is not how you do social media. There’s plenty of value in social media for real estate agents!

Instead, take advantage of your knowledge as a small business owner and share things that are locally relevant. Do you sponsor a charity? Share updates for upcoming events and then post photos from them. Foodie? Let people know about new restaurant openings and your reviews. Weekend warrior? Share tips and tricks for homeowners to help with DIY projects, local discounts, and businesses that you’d recommend. Get creative with it and learn that 80% of what you share not about you will in fact help you grow in popularity and usefulness.

5. Automate Some Of Your Social

Now I know that a lot of you are thinking that no one who runs a small business on their own has all this time throughout the day to find fun content to share like blog posts and local articles, but there is something that you can do to ease the stress of commitment. Personally, I use an application called Buffer. This nifty little tool helps me be social when I don’t have time to be. I set aside about 30 minutes each week, find blog posts and articles that related to my business, and schedule them to go out on LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+, and Facebook throughout the week.

 

6. Go Mobile!

Believe me when I say that people LOVE photos and videos. We’re all visual beings and with that, posting photos help other truly comprehend what you’re trying to convey. So if you’ve set up your Facebook and Twitter accounts to share out high quality blog post content throughout the week, that leave you free to interject your voice whenever you get a free moment. All major social networks that you should care about have very decent mobile applications. On your phone, you should definitely have installed Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. If you’re using them, download and install Pinterest and Google+ as well. At a coffee shop working on your holiday card? Share a photo of your latte! Marching in a local benefit walk? Send photos of you and your colleagues. Let people know that you have a life outside of selling houses and reach them with content that they want to read.

7. Ask For Referrals!

Like I mentioned above, the 80/20 rule means that about 80% of everything you share should be geared to not promote yourself or your business in a boasting way. But don’t worry, I didn’t leave out that 20%. Think of that as your earned social currency. For every 8 posts you send out not related to your business, feel free to send out two things about your business. Maybe it’s about your referral program, a new listing, or lower interest rates. Just as long as these messages don’t outweigh the others, you’ll be good to go. So go ahead, get those referrals, and make sure it’s not the focus of what you do on your social media accounts.

Content marketing is a tough thing to do but the days of pushing your marketing messages out to consumers are fading quickly. It’s so easy to drown out bad marketing. We skip commercials with DVR’s, we send junk mail into the trash and bad emails to the SPAM folder. What does work is not being intrusive with your clients, keeping them interested in what you have to say through valuable, interesting content, and building up those personal relationships through email and social media. That’s how you’re going to get your referral business up and soaring in 2014!

______________________________________

Increase customer contact and follow-up with our fully customizable Real Estate Agent Business Cards. Card features a Property Information Form on the reverse side. 90lb White Linen card stock. Box of 100. Ships Tomorrow!

Real Estate Agent Business Card (Pearl Finish)

Photo Business Cards (Pearl Finish)


Metal Business Card Case
Our sleak metal business card case is a must have for any executive! Luxery meets practicality with this contemporary and stylish executive card case. Put your best first impression forward to your clients and associates. Card case features a faux velvet inlay and snap closure. Holds 15 cards. Size: 3.69"W x 2.35"L x .34"d. Fully customizeable with your name and/or business logo.

Real Estate Agent Business Card (Pearl Finish)

Increase customer contact and follow-up with our fully customizable Real Estate Agent Business Cards. Card features a Property Information Form on the reverse side. 90lb White Linen card stock. Box of 100. Ships Tomorrow!

 

Real Estate Agent Business Card (Pearl Finish)

 

Photo Business Cards (Pearl Finish) 


Metal Business Card Case
Our sleak metal business card case is a must have for any executive! Luxery meets practicality with this contemporary and stylish executive card case. Put your best first impression forward to your clients and associates. Card case features a faux velvet inlay and snap closure. Holds 15 cards. Size: 3.69"W x 2.35"L x .34"d. Fully customizeable with your name and/or business logo.