And, while you may have found success dealing within a certain niche or a certain part of the neighborhood, it’s important to never let your marketing become stale.
Keeping up with technology trends and new-fangled marketing tactics while maintaining integrity to yourself and the brand you’ve built is necessary to make sure your business and the services you offer are ever-evolving with the times.
Sure, that email newsletter you’ve been sending out for the last five years has won you some listings. But what was the open rate on the most recent one you sent? Is your message becoming tired and lost in prospects’ inboxes?
Does your logo still scream “Party like it’s 1999” for 2021?
In the vast world of real estate marketing, there are many different strategies agents can use to market themselves. Some prefer traditional methods, others digital and some go with a mix to maximize their exposure.
No matter where you fall under the marketing umbrella, here are 25 marketing ideas to help you maintain your effectiveness in your area of business.
1. Create a Unique Business Card
One of the best ways to stand out is to create a unique business card. Not only will it help your card stick out from dozens of basic ones, but it’s also a great way to show off your personality.
2. Make Yourself Easy to Contact
In addition to making sure your contact information is on all fliers, business cards and other marketing materials you hand out, put your contact information on every single page of your website.
3. Update Your Logo
What was “in” even five years ago is likely out today. You definitely don’t want to completely revamp or lose your brand, but slight tweaks can give your logo and brand a modern touch and keep you from seeming out of date.
4. Embrace Postcards
Snail mail isn’t dead. In fact, some people enjoy getting it as it becomes less frequent. Create your own design and send out a new postcard every so often highlighting a couple of new listings.
5. Upgrade Your Photos
With the advancement of smartphone cameras there’s really no excuse for you not to have high-quality photos for your listings, website and social media profiles.
6. Ask for Referrals
The lifeblood of business for real estate agents. Post testimonials on your website, print marketing materials and social media pages – just don’t go overboard.
7. Handwritten Thank You Notes
Don’t underestimate the personal touch of a handwritten note. In this digital and social age, a handwritten note is a great way to separate yourself from the competition.
8. Build a Free Offer
Create a piece of content for your website that’s so intriguing people won’t think twice about handing over their email address to download it. Think along the lines of “10 Things Every New Homeowner Needs to Know,” but make sure to target various types of prospective clients to build a solid database.
9. Create a Neighborhood Video Tour
Yes, you’re selling a house. But you’re also selling a location. Making a quick video telling the story of the neighborhood helps you answer questions about more than the property. And you only need to make one video for each neighborhood you specialize in because you can constantly reuse it for multiple listings within that area.
10. Write for the Local Newspaper
Does your newspaper have a real estate section? Rather than simply putting your listings in the paper, offer to additionally write a weekly or monthly column. It’s a great way to show off your expertise.
11. Appear on Local TV/Radio
Same reasoning as the above, only via different outlets.
12. Partner with Local Business
Develop relationship with other local businesses to help get your name out there via placemats, mugs or other creative ideas.
13. Local Sponsorship
Do your local high school sports team have any halftime contests or pregame festivities you can attach your business’ name to?
14. Donate to a Local Charity
It can be real estate-related, such as Habitat for Humanity, or something that hits closer to home like cancer awareness.
15. Host Free Get Togethers
Share your market knowledge and expertise with those who might not need your services quite yet, but are still interested in the home-buying process. Consider hosting a weekly or monthly meeting at your gym, place of worship or the local library.
16. Create an Online Quiz
Buzzfeed is wildly successful doing quizzes on almost any subject, so a quiz testing citizens on tidbits and history of your area is sure to garner some clicks.
17. Blog
Blogging is a great way to boost your credibility for both prospective clients and Google, helping to enhance your digital footprint. Here are four ways to drive traffic to your blog.
18. Video Marketing
Here are seven video ideas for real estate marketing.
19. Actively Post on Social Media
There’s no point to being on any social platform as a business if you don’t take advantage of it. Make sure to engage by posting often and responding to comments. Here are five ways social media can help grow your real estate business.
20. Social Advertising
While not cheap or organic, it probably beats your old black and white advertisement in the local newspaper. All social media platforms offer some form of advertising, but Facebook ads are typically the best bang for your buck.
21. Create Infographics
Social media posts are much more likely to foster engagement if they’re visual, so use a tool such as Canva to create eye-popping infographics that are easily digested and shared.
22. Know Your Audiences
Yes, you should be writing toward your main clientele, whether it’s homebuyers or sellers. But you should also write everything – blogs, social posts and listing descriptions – with Google bots in mind. Here are five essential tips for local SEO real estate writing.
23. Make it Easy to Share
Add social sharing buttons to property pages, as well as blog posts, so visitors can easily share your listings and/or posts with their social network.
24. Automation
Marketing is an essential part of your business, but it’s only one part. Much like how you automate other processes such as showing management and feedback, consider email marketing or social media automation tools to help you better manage your time and resources.
25. Regularly Clean Your Database
Make sure your prospect lists are actually prospects who are interested in your services. Not all leads are created the same and a list of hundreds of engaged prospects is better than an unengaged list of thousands.
Are you a real estate agent looking for tools that can help you save time and streamline your business? Learn how the ShowingTime Appointment Center can help by serving as your personal assistant