The home may be where the heart is, but more and more these days, home is actually where the marketing is.
Real estate companies are increasingly coming to understand the power of online marketing. They’re using it as a winning strategy to grow their brand, increase sales, and amplify their voice in the local marketplace.
Using social media to connect and engage with your target audience is a must in this day and age.
For one, creating a social media marketing strategy is an inexpensive way to not only boost sales but more importantly, it allows you to connect with your audience on a different level than with just an advertisement alone.
You can also receive feedback from potential clients and get a general idea of their likes and dislikes.
It’s important to get a feel for your audience and platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram allow you to do that. As more and more of the general public stays connected through their phones on social media, you have the ability to reach them outside of regular business hours and on the weekend.
Of course, not every client is necessarily going to be active on all of those networks, so pay attention to the conversations happening and adjust your messaging accordingly.
For example, you might discover that the minority of your “house flippers” spend most of their time on Facebook, while fellow realtors who you could potentially work with on upcoming deals might use LinkedIn as their primary platform.
Facebook is a great place to share upcoming events your agency might be hosting. You can create events on the site and invite everyone who “likes” your business page, or you can narrow it down to specific people.
Instagram, on the other hand, might be the space where you find more people who are looking to purchase new homes to call their own. This is a great space to post photos of homes you have listed for sale or ones you expect to be on the market shortly.
2. Video marketing integration
The use of video in your content marketing is becoming more popular as it becomes easier to integrate into your digital marketing strategy. With most phones equipped with cameras, the ability to film virtually anywhere is right at your fingertips.
Video is also an excellent way to incorporate your personality into your business and give your customers an emotional connection with your brand.
One of the biggest advantages of creating video content is that it gives you the chance to tell your story.
In general, online marketing and advertisements focus on the basic information we all need to know to make the first decision in the buyer’s journey, but the downfall is that basic information isn’t necessarily personal.
Video content changes all of that, namely because it gives you the opportunity to create branded content that speaks directly to your target audience.
The possibilities are endless when it comes to using video in your digital marketing strategy, and it’s especially useful in the real estate industry. The majority of your audience is likely either current homeowners or people looking to purchase their first home.
You can create instructional how-to videos on sprucing up your home for a showing or you can use it on a walk-through on a property that’s about to be listed for sale. Not only does it showcase your personality, but it gives potential clients that individualized content that engages them when deciding if you’re the agent best for them.
Video content also offers a medium for you to have a little fun. You don’t have to be “all business, all the time,” and a video lets you show off the more fun side of yourself.
Consider giving your audience a day in your life or talking about the most luxurious property you’ve ever had the opportunity to sell. Opening up and showing off a little of your own personality is a fun (and easy) way to attract potential clients.
3. User-friendly website
How frustrating is it when you find out a potential business you want to work with has a website that isn’t very intuitive?
With the internet quickly becoming the primary venue for businesses, it is incredibly important to have a user-friendly website. This allows potential customers to navigate with ease and find the information they want.
Of course, none of this is all that helpful if you don’t have a clear view of how clients are interacting with your website. This is where website analytics come into play.
There are several aspects of your site that need to be monitored, ranging from your company blog and the impact it has on potential clients to mentions of your brand online.
Monitoring the activity on your website will give you a great view of what’s working for your target audience and what might need some improvement.
Once you have enough information about traffic and website activity you can make the necessary changes.
4. SEO and link building
While the trends of online marketing tools seem to be in constant evolution, one of the things that remained steady is the use of SEO and link building.
Granted, the rules have changed a bit over the years regarding what’s allowed and what isn’t according to the almighty Google, but the overall importance of both is still pretty close to the top of the list.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the use of keywords, relevant to your industry, to help make your business’s website easier to find online. This helps by increasing your domain authority and eventually with enough consistent effort, your ranking on Google.
Link building, on the other hand, is the exchanging of links with other sites via a few different ways to help build up your site’s backlinks.
The more complicated parts of the strategy are deciding which keywords work best for you and what are the best ways to use them. This is where Google Analytics comes in.
Google Analytics is a free service you can use with your website that helps you monitor everything that happens on your site. On top of that, it can help you decide which keywords are actually going to help give your site a boost with its Keyword Planner and more.
This is a long process and you should be prepared to put in consistent work to get the boost you want, but it’s completely free. The ROI is extreme and if you’re serious about using digital marketing to help build your real estate business, this is a great place to start.
However, remember that before you take off running with all of your new online marketing initiatives, especially if there will be any kind of data collection or ecommerce via a new site, social media, and so on — that you should always ensure you’re properly covered financially, just in case.
More online marketing activity via social media, content marketing, SEO, and basically just putting yourself out there more, might attract some less than honest characters.
Taking up an online marketing and digital media campaign for your real estate business might seem overwhelming and a little bit of an uphill battle at first. But after all the hard work is put into it, online marketing will not only feel easier as you find your niche, but you should see a positive turn in ROI in no time. Good luck!
Ainsley Lawrence is a writer who loves to talk about good health, balanced life, and better living through technology. She is frequently lost in a good book.
