A Guide to Using Real Estate Hashtags for Social Media Marketing

The proliferation of smart devices such as smartphones having access to social media has made search function more important than ever. In fact, the National Association of Realtors reports that more than 90% of millennials start their home searches online instead of in-person referrals. This is why real estate agencies should begin to use hashtags as a way of driving more traffic to their websites.

As agencies and individual agents seek out new ways to stand out from the competition and make connections with potential clients, real estate hashtags are one of the best social media marketing tools to use in your strategy, especially on Instagram and Twitter. Real estate hashtags attract more leads, build your brand, drive traffic, increase click-throughs and engage with potential clients and other colleagues in the real estate industry.

Intro to Real Estate Hashtags

Hashtags are used in social media posts to indicate that content is related to a specific topic. You can create them by using the # symbol followed by words, like #realestateagent.

Hashtags are a valuable tool for real estate professionals looking to reach new audiences on social media. But don’t just rely on any hashtag — do your research and choose wisely if you want to maximize your chances of being found.

Researching Real Estate Hashtags

To find real estate hashtags, visit a social media site or app and search for popular hashtags that relate to real estate. Links to top posts and recent posts using these hashtags can provide insight into how best to engage an audience using this medium.

There are also several websites that generate and track trending hashtags on various topics. Examples are Best-Hashtags, All Hashtag, Hashtagify, Sistrix, Inflact, and many more!

How to Use Real Estate Hashtags

Remember the hashtag limit.

Too many hashtags can make your post look like spam, and may result in low or no engagements.

As a guide, you can use as many as 30 hashtags on Instagram posts and up to 10 hashtags on IG stories. Sproutsocial recommends using 1-2 hashtags on Twitter and Facebook, 2-3 hashtags on LinkedIn, and none on Pinterest.

Vary your hashtags based on the post.

Try to find a wide variety of real estate-related hashtags that you can rotate through. This will not only help improve your exposure but also avoid any penalties from the social media platforms that do not allow repeating the same hashtags in every post.

Place hashtags into the caption for better reach.

Several studies have been performed to determine where hashtags should be placed in an Instagram caption. According to a Social Insider study, hashtag placement affects small and medium-size Instagram pages' reach per post:

• Profiles with under 5,000 followers: 36.85% average reach rate per post with hashtags in the caption
• Profiles with 5,000-10,000 followers: 20.98% average reach rate per post with hashtags in the caption
• Profiles with 10,000-50,000 followers: 21.47% average reach rate per post with hashtags in the caption

Be specific with your hashtags.

To appeal to more prospective clients, it is important to be specific with your hashtags. You can use location-centered hashtags to attract people in your area.

For example, #realestateagent is a very popular hashtag with 17.75 million Instagram posts, but so is #realestateagents with only 1.57 million posts. Instead of using these, you can localize the hashtag based on property location like #realestateflorida with 87K posts only. This gives you a better chance of being seen by prospective clients.

Keep up with the competitors.

It is important to always be on the lookout for new ways to reach potential customers. One way to do this is by monitoring the hashtags used by your competitors. By keeping an eye on which hashtags are receiving a lot of user engagement, you can quickly adapt and implement these ideas into your own marketing strategy.

Final Thoughts

As technology and the way we use it continue to rapidly change, it's important to find new ways to establish an online presence that will lead your target audience in the direction you want them to go. By combining a well-thought-out strategy, with real estate hashtags, you can create a strong social media presence that will ultimately lead to more leads and bottom-line growth for your business.